The Rise and Fall
by TyrantFlame
Summary: CHAP.12 UP! PLS review... ; So sorry, i've been hibernating! Ahem! The digimons and their masters run into more trouble...
1. Default Chapter

The rise and fall- chapter 1  
  
:P Inspired by, yup, Craig David's Rise and fall... What!? I can't help it! The song's cool!  
  
Rouge: Good news, our kids are taking over for us. (slings an arm around Alara's shoulder)  
  
Alara: (sigh...) more work to be done, don't you think?  
  
Lots. Hey! Are you gonna read or not!?  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
P/S: Thanx Iniora Nackatori for 'reminding' me to dig this out of my trash can! ^_^  
  
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Sometimes in life you feel the fight is over,  
  
And it seems as though the writings on the wall,  
  
Superstar you finally made it,  
  
But once your picture becomes tainted,  
  
It's what they call,  
  
The rise and fall  
  
'...Sheesh... Whut time is it...?' a red-headed boy mumbled from under his covers. His blanket was pulled over his head and he was curled up in a fetal position. His feet were poking from the little cover they have and his arm darted out and was expecting to slam on the night-side radio when he couldn't feel a damn thing and ended up swinging his arm at the air. Where was his night-table!? Then he realized it wasn't his radio singing. It was someone else.  
  
"I always said that I was gonna make it,  
  
Now it's plain for everyone to see,  
  
But this game I'm in don't take no prisoners,  
  
Just casualties,  
  
I know that everything is gonna cha..." the singer was cut short by a pillow thrown to his head. He pulled it off roughly and glared at the half-asleep boy on the bed with all three eyes. Three? Yes, three.  
  
"What's your prob?" he asked, slight anger in his tone. The red-head boy just sighed and pointed to the clock hung above his bed.  
  
"I should be the one saying that. Lars..." he started.  
  
"Rouge." Lars cut in. He shrugged and continued.  
  
"The same. Anyway! Do you have any idea what time it is?" he asked.  
  
"Uh... 5.30 in the morning?" he said, looking at the clock.  
  
"Exactly. I've got school later and..."  
  
"No, you can't go to school. Not today at least." Another creature said, gazing out of the window.  
  
"Why? What's gonna happen Wick?" the wizard didn't respond. Ever since he was reborn, his sixth sense and everything about him changed. Except his personality. He can feel something going on and he knew it was very bad. Lars walked over to the window, as if he knew what Wick had felt but, a glimpse of a sudden but very brief light caught his attention.  
  
"Hey Wick, is that what I think it is...?" Lars asked, getting a nod from the wizard. The door burst open and Lars' counterpart sister, E-vie rushed in.  
  
"Brother! Did you see it!?" she asked, as if she had just run a thousand miles. Her tamer and Sorcerimon, well, Witchmon ever since she was reborn and now known as Wyna, entered as well. The Water Crystal on her staff glowed brightly, indicating approaching enemies. She stared at it briefly but hard and said,  
  
"We've got company. Come! 'He' will arrive soon!" Wyna declared and led the group downstairs just in time to see a girl wield a sword. And strangely enough, she looked a lot like their mom but, she wasn't any taller than any of the twins! A digimon stood before her and it was a clown. It was juggling three colored balls playfully and it was smiling like a clown would. It sat on a wooden unicycle, which seemed brand new although well-worn.  
  
"Whaddya want!? You just bust in here without knocking and I don't take no rudeness!" the girl said, standing in a stance that looked strikingly Kotemon's. The clown cackled and pointed at her with a staff. The balls it was juggling seemed to disappear into thin air and it said,  
  
"Digidestines must be eliminated! This is the master's order!" it said as cards were shot out of the tip of the staff. Wick jumped in between the cards and the girl, raised his staff and yelled,  
  
"Wind Shield!" a sudden gust of wind answered him as it formed a barrier in between them. The cards were stopped but, some of the walls were cracked from the force of stopping the cards. E-vie stood behind the sword-wielding girl and pulled her gun out. It glowed faintly with a red glow and pulled the trigger.  
  
"DEGENERATOR!" she shot but, she wasn't aiming for the clown's head, she aimed for the unicycle. It broke, and even the pieces vanished. The clown, caught off guard, accidentally stood on its feet and screamed bloody murder as its whole body erupted in flames.  
  
Once the flame died down, the sword-wielder turned to Wyna and E-vie and said,  
  
"Thanks a lot, you two. Say... aren't you... Sylver!? What happened to you!? I know what happened when we fought Piedmon last time but... but... AHHH!! Wick! You too!? Who're these two!?" she said, almost horrified while pointing at the twins.  
  
"(sigh...) we have a lot to talk about. Come on, let's start by introducing ourselves." Wick said.  
  
'Why do we have to?' Rico wondered.  
  
"Hi! I'm Kimber. And this is my twin brother, Rico. The cool mon there is Lars..."  
  
"I'M TELLIN' YA! CALL ME ROUGE!" he said, blowing his top.  
  
"Whatever... and this here is E-vie. And, may I ask how you know Wick and Wyna?" she asked.  
  
"Wyna? Her name's Sylver. Except the fact she looks totally different now. Wick too. He changed. Where's Koryu and Rena?" she asked.  
  
"Before we get there... what's your name?" E-vie asked.  
  
"Me?"  
  
"Yeah you." Lars said.  
  
"Oh, okay."  
  
"Speak up!" Rico demanded.  
  
"Hold your horses! My name is Kimkay Strife. Everyone, namely Mike and Meredy, call me Kay." All(except Wick and Wyna) jaws dropped.  
  
"WHAT!!!????!?!?!?" They yelled.  
  
"What!? I didn't do nuthin' wrong!" Kay said, covering her ears.  
  
"Hm... someone used a time spell on her..." Wyna said.  
  
"Obviously. But, for now, we really need her help."  
  
Meanwhile, the others...  
  
"Hey Tosh, have you looked out the window lately?" Ronfar said, on the phone.  
  
"Yeah, I have. For the last 4 hours. I'm trying to get Koga to look away from the window right now!" Tosh said, pulling at the kendo digimon.  
  
"What were you doing before that?" Ronfar asked.  
  
"Well, thanks to a Rosemon, I'm parentless and half of my house, save my room, is in ruins! I'm trying to get outta my... GYAH!!" Tosh was hauled on Dinohumon's shoulder and he jumped out of the window.  
  
"Hello?! Tosh!?" Ronfar said, alarmed.  
  
"I'm fine! I'm fine! Just Koga."  
  
"That's good. Anyway... Did you say... Rosemon?" Tosh was speechless for a minute.  
  
"Y...yeah..."  
  
"I don't like the sound of that. Anyway, meet you later. Monji told me to go to the park later." With that, he hung up on his cellphone. A little girl entered his ruined room and Monji, Ronfar's Monmon walked up to her and sniffed her.  
  
"What's wrong, Monmon? Don't you recognize me? It's me, Meredy!" she said, hugging the monkey digimon. Ronfar whirled around and saw his mom, his age! His cellphone rang and he answered it.  
  
"H... He-hello...?" he stammered.  
  
"RONFAR!!!!! YOU WON'T BELIEVE THIS!!!!! MYDAD'SRIGHTHEREWITHMEANDHE'SNOTHIMSELF,WELL,YEAHHEISBUTHE'SMY HEIGHT,MYAGEANDEVERYTHINGABOUTME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" It's Jake. The same thing happened to him.  
  
What will happen? And what was that flash all about? Look out for chapter 2!  
  
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DONE!! And to my FFFFAAAAAAVVVVOOOOORRRIIIITTTTEEEE reviewers, especially A-chan, thanx for inspiring me to continue DYSR! ^_^  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	2. Hello Nina!

The Rise and Fall-chapter 2  
  
WHOO-HOO!!! 2nd chap and they meet Nina again!!! ^_^  
  
To Iniora: See? I told u I can think of something! But, if you'd pay more attention to Future Awakes' last chapter, you would've known that Kay IS their mom. (I even stated that one on the first chapter of Future Awakes!)  
  
To blackmage718: (sniff, sniff) When you didn't review, I thought you were planning on sending the Viral Army on me!!! I was scared!!! (cries on Lars' shoulder)  
  
Lars(now and until the author's note is finished will be known as Rouge.) : What did they do to you this time...?  
  
Thanx for reviewing, BTW! ^_^  
  
To A-chan: WHEE!!! YOU'RE READING THIS LI'L FIC O' MINE!!! (dances around Jenny happily) I'm so glad you like it and yeah, I'm working on chapter 3 for DYSR right now. ^_^ Thanx 2 u!  
  
*SPECIAL!!!!*SPECIAL*SPEACIAL!!!!*  
  
Regina girl and Rena: YAY!!! YOU TWO'RE HERE!! (hugz both in a vice grip and lets them go after 5 minutes) I REALLY appreciate this, you two! BTW, when're you gonna start writin'?  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
PS; Bear in mind that the adults are now as young as they were in 'A nightmare come True'. Iniora, read my first digi- fic if you wanna know.  
  
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"It looks like we are being challenged." Renamon said, sitting on a tree branch in the park.  
  
"Sure looks like it but what're we supposed to do?" Kumamon said, looking up at Renamon.  
  
"We are to go to the Digital World once more." Wick said, after thinking of what to do next with Wyna.  
  
"Why are we going there for? We don't have anymore business with Piedmon or someone." Mike, Jake's 'dad', asked.  
  
"Unfortunately, even if I tell you, you three won't be able to go in the Digital World anymore." Wyna said, standing next to Wick.  
  
"What!? Then what're we gonna do here!? Be sitting ducks and do nothin'!? Bah! I'm not gonna stand up with that!" Kay said, slamming his fist on the ground.  
  
"Who said you're not gonna do anything!?" said a voice.  
  
"Witchmon..." Wyna said softly as the said digimon appeared with three eggs.  
  
"The Gate to the Digital World is kind of altered right now, making any digimon able to come to the Real world. At least, you three, plus a girl in New York, is going to protect this place. Here're your partners. The rest of the kids are going to the digital world." Witchmon said, handing the eggs over. Kay received a Clowmon, Jake with a Patamon and Meredy with a Biyomon.  
  
"Man, this sucks..." Kay complained.  
  
"Why should I care? I've got lots of things to take care of in the digital World as it is and you guys better get moving too." Witchmon said before disappearing into thin air.  
  
"Well? What're we waitin' for? Let's go!" Raye announced, pumping her fist in the air. Wick nodded and both Wyna and he chanted a teleportation spell.  
  
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They arrived in a village of ruins. Wick squinted at the place and looked around. The place looked familiar. An old looking digimon saw them and approached them.  
  
"What? More humans!?" he said. Everyone turned to the voice and saw an old Wizardmon like digimon. Again, Wick squinted at the digimon and his eyes widened.  
  
"Mysticmon? Is that you?" the elderly digimon looked surprised.  
  
"Wizardmon? You have returned! How long have you been away? You have grown too." Mysticmon said, looking at Wick from head to toe.  
  
"Oh, yes, Mysticmon, these humans and digimons are my friends. We want to know if a human girl with three Virus Mega-leveled digimon passed through here before we did." Wick explained. Mysticmon scratched his chin thoughtfully and said,  
  
"Yes, they are on their way to the Invisible Canyon right now. I suppose you can meet her there. Why do you ask?" Mysticmon questioned. Wick glanced at Rico and got a nod of approval.  
  
"We need to stop someone before 'he' reaches her." Wick said. Mysticmon nodded.  
  
"Very well... you may go to the Invisible Canyon but I warn you, I saw a mysterious mist there. Watch your steps, young ones. Or your first shall be your last." Mysticmon warned. They all nodded, heeding the warning.  
  
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They reached the Invisible Canyon alright but, with all the strange mist here, I don't think they'll be able to get around too much but, won't they when they meet someone? Kimber walked ahead of them and bumped into someone's back.  
  
"Nina!" Kimber said as she recognized the person in front of her. Rico and the rest of the gang were there too and also greeted the fellow digidestined. Nina stood up, brushed her trousers off and smiled at them.  
  
"Hey guys. Long time no see. How's it goin'?" she asked.  
  
"We're so glad we met you! Where're your digimons?" Kimber asked.  
  
"I guess I got lost." Now, this doesn't sound like Nina at all. She never gets separated from her digimons. At least one of the three would be alongside her! Kimber backed away from 'Nina' slowly and 'Rouge'(Lars will be known by this name throughout the fic from now.) stepped up in front of the red- headed girl protectively and said,  
  
"So, you're not Nina after all, aren't you?" he questioned. 'Nina' frowned. From the back, Wick spoke up.  
  
"You're not even human. Tell me, who are you? Why do you scatter this magical mist?" Again, 'Nina' frowned. Suddenly, the mist surrounding them grew thicker and a strong magic made the mist immobilize them and instead of Nina in front of them, a different form stood. No doubt about it. It was a gijinka digimon, just like Arukenimon in her human form. Its eyes were blood red, as if it were possessed by something. A crystal was set upon the staff it held. It wore a long coat that was buttoned up till its waist, a pair of black trousers and shoes and its long hair, tied up in a ponytail blew in the wind.  
  
"That's strange... How did you know I was merely imitating someone...?" it slurred, moving closer to the group. It wasn't walking like how normal digimons would, more like how a zombie would. It stood in front of Rouge(Would you mind if I call him Rouche?) , its face merely inches away from the Virus' own.  
  
"You. You are just what the Master needs..." It slurred again.  
  
"What the hell are you talkin' about? I ain't listenin' to any of your crud!" Rouche said, trying to move. A 'string' of mist surrounded Rouche and somehow, cut off his nerve connections. The Mega collapsed, only half conscious as he was lifted up again by a levitation magic.  
  
"You...have a strong source of energy... The master would be most pleased..." Rouche had a sinking feeling that this wasn't a good sign. If Wyna or Wick weren't immobilized and silenced, they would've gotten him out of this mess. Suddenly, the strange digimon in front of him plunged its hand into his torso, not wounding him but, it was searching for something within him. It didn't hurt much at first but, the pain grew more intense as its arm went deeper into him. It was as if something was going to eat him inside out.  
  
"Stop it!!! Put him down, Mistmon!!!" E-vie screamed. Somehow, she knew the mon. somehow. The mentioned digimon looked at her like a possessed person and he was swaying to an imaginary breeze. Rouche's cry of pain was growing louder by the minute and finally, Mistmon pulled his arm out of the Virus Mega, dropping him harshly. In his hand was a reddish- purple orb.  
  
"Finally..." he was still swaying to an imaginary breeze as another digimon in robes appeared behind him.  
  
"Mistmon, hand it over. I shall give it to the Master." It was a Daemon. As instructed, he turned around and gave the demon the orb. Daemon smirked.  
  
"Foolish mon... I couldn't believe it was so easy to take over your mind. And, you digidestines won't stand a chance against the Master. Not even your digimons would! HA, HA, HA, HA!!!" The demon cackled before it felt something explode on its back. Some of the garments were burnt but most of them were still intact. Right after Daemon was attacked, Mistmon suddenly collapsed and the mist cleared, making the digidestines able to locate what was happening and saw a girl wielding a sword with a crimson jewel.  
  
"Nina!" Kimber said happily. Nina smirked.  
  
"How'd you guys get into this deep of a mess?" she asked before turning towards the demon, airborne by the minute. Bee, Black and Lucifer were at it, firing away at the agile demon, well, at least trying to get his robes on fire. (HEY!! IT'S FLAMMABLE!!!) Ronfar rubbed his eyes and looked at Bee a few times.  
  
"Is it just me or is that a white Beelzemon?" he said, looking at Tosh, who was closest to him. Just then, Black managed to scratch the demon across the face and while it was holding it's face, howling in agony, Lucifer tried to immobilize him but, he was a tad too slow, missed and the demon got away. Lucifer snapped his fingers in a 'That was too close' gesture and turned to Nina. Nina didn't notice Mistmon while they were fighting Daemon off and when she did, she went over to the gijinka water mage digimon and carefully picked him up, brushing a lock of stray hair from the digimon's face. His body felt cold and almost deathly cold but he was still breathing, almost like a living dead. Bee had just healed Lars and in an almost panicked tone, Nina called out to the white angel.  
  
"Bee, come over here quick! This guy needs help!" Bee kneeled down next to Mistmon's unconscious form and tried to heal the digimon. He stopped mid-way and Nina was puzzled.  
  
"There seems to be a curse cast on him. I can't use any of my healing abilities on him." Bee said, crossing his arms across his chest. Nina felt her heart drop to the pit of her stomach. Mistmon was nice to her. Too nice that he almost acted like an elder brother to her.  
  
A/N: Iniora Nackatori, don't misunderstand! This ain't the pairing I told you about! _  
  
"Then... what're we gonna do now...?" Nina whispered to no one in particular, looking down at the unconscious mon.  
  
"Is there any way for us to help him?" she raised her voice a bit, loud enough for everyone to hear her. Lars gave a weird look at her and said,  
  
"Are you nuts!? That thing just dug his arm at me, made me collapse and you're helping him!?" Nina didn't reply. She didn't need to. E-vie whacked her brother upside the head and the twins both kicked him in the shins. He fell to his knees, rubbing his aching shins.  
  
"Jerk!" Kimber said.  
  
"You're so slow in noticing! He's obviously brainwashed back there!" Rico said, folding his arms.  
  
"...A curse, huh...? We'll need to send him to the 'witch- doctor' then." Wick said, smiling.  
  
"Witch-doctor?" they all asked, and the wizard behind them just nodded, still smiling.  
  
Later, they found themselves inside Witchmon's hut. She swung the door open after getting annoyed by their continuous knocking and nearly screamed,  
  
"WHADDYA WANT!!?!?!?!?!?" Wick and Wyna tried to contain their laughter but, they entered anyway.  
  
"We have an emergency, actually." Renamon said, leaning against the wall. Witchmon huffed and straightened her 'out- of-placed' hat and looked at her 'patient'.  
  
"What do you think I look like? A witch-doctor?" wrong words, Witchmon...  
  
"Exactly." Came the chorused reply. Oh well, majority wins, right? Witchmon surrendered and levitated Mistmon over a spell star she made on the floor.  
  
"Oh, I can't do this alone. The curse barrier is too strong. Both of you, come over here." She gestured at Wick and Wyna, who complied and stood in a triangle, with Mistmon in the middle.  
  
"What are we supposed to do? We don't know how to lift curses." Wyna said.  
  
"Just read my mind. You can do that, can't you?" Witchmon said. They started, and it took them sometime to finish. While they were at it, The kids had a chat.  
  
"Hey Nina, how come you know this digimon before us?" Rico asked, cocking his head to look at the girl's eyes. She looked up at him and inhaled.  
  
"We met him at the Invisible canyon. He asked for help FROM us to get rid of whoever is behind all this and in charge of the destruction of the Wizard's village." She said, keeping things short.  
  
"There's a lot more to tell than that actually." Black said, tapping his cheek.  
  
"Well, alright. We'll listen to the whole thing first but, whatever we do first, let's eat..." Ronfar complained. Everyone looked at him and said simultaneously,  
  
"You and your stupid stomach!"  
  
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O.O;; This is way too long for my own good...  
  
Wick: You betcha'.  
  
Maybe I'll sign off till the next chappie.  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	3. We're back, up and kicking!

The Rise and Fall-chapter 3  
  
To A-chan: ^_^ glad you like him. I'm starting on his plushie right now, actually... but I can't get his staff right!!  
  
To Iniora Nackatori: Well, let's just say he emptied their emergency food supply last time. :P But otherwise... ARIGATO!!!(thanks)  
  
To blackmage718: (still out cold) (wakes up after Rouge threw a bucket of cold water, INCLUDING the bucket itself on my head) DO YOU MIND, ROUGE!? Huh? A review? FROM BLACK!!! YAY!! Thank goodness, erm... evilness that Dae's alright! ^_^;(still soaked from water) Hee,hee,hee. just tell him he's gonna stay 'till the end of this fic. And maybe, just maybe, I MIGHT put a certain character called Heather in! ^_^  
  
To Renagirl and Rena: Glad ur still reading. I'M STUCK WITH MY DYSR FIC!!!! Newayz, hope u enjoy THIS chapter.  
  
To Corran: YOU HAVEN'T UPLOADED THE 6TH CHAPTER, HAVE YOU!!???!?!?!? Yeah, everything's well in the world, if not for an unlucky thanksgiving turkey named Saddam... :P  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
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Everyone was taking an afternoon nap while waiting for the three wizards to dispel the curse on Mistmon. Nina was all cuddled up in between Bee and Lucifer, Black sitting right next to Lucifer. Tosh was holding his Kotemon, almost cradling it, Jennifer lying down on her Renamon's lap, Raye leaning against her Kumamon(yeah, it's strong enough to hold her weight.) The twins were leaning against each other, Rico holding out his arms protectively around his younger sister. The pair, Beelzemon and VampBeelzemon(as how E-vie wants to be known as.) , were wide awake. The first to wake up was Lars, followed by E-vie as they both walked outside and sat on their respective bikes.  
  
"Something's strange but I can't put a finger to it." Lars said, crossing his arms behind his head and leaned back, gazing up at the darkening sky. E-vie nodded. She knew what he meant and somehow, what they were feeling was... familiar. In some ways. The only thing they can tell was that it felt like its part of them.  
  
In an abandoned castle, far away from where they were, empty gray halls were filled with a single humming voice and the sounds of heels walking on the cold, stone floor. It sounded like a she as it walked into a throne room and looked at an old chair at what seemed to be a throne. She giggled and strode across the room and plopped onto the old throne. Surprisingly, it managed to hold her weight as if it were brand new.  
  
"Looks like our death is forbidden, Rouge..." she whispered to no one in particular and at the very same time, some small heaps of debris moved, stayed and moved some more to un-earth a Beelzemon in a coughing fit as dust flew everywhere around him. He kicked some big blocks of stone off and brushed himself, coughing yet again and shook some more dust out of his blonde hair. He sighed and out of nowhere, a black motorcycle appeared in front of him. He patted it and it made a strange wheezing-honking sound and he smiled at its response.  
  
"So, we're not wanted in the Digi-heaven? We're back in digi- hell. Ready or not, we've got some 'haunting' to do." He said as he mounted his bike and for once, felt even more alive as he sped off into the night.  
  
It was daybreak when Lars felt a cold gush of water get into his eyes and he sat up, yelping and rubbed his eyes as if the water was onion juice. (really, I hate chopping onions!!! _) he glared at the water witch next to him and saw her smile in a way that told him he was a sucker.  
  
"Everyone's having breakfast. You wanna miss out on the good fish? 'Sides, it's not everyday you get to eat digi-trout. Thank Lucifer and Black for the fishing. The berries are good too. By the way, I thought I heard someone sing the song of life last night." Wyna said, turning to Lars. He had no idea what she was talking about but, what he felt last night was getting too near and too familiar he felt uncomfortable.  
  
"I have no idea whatsoever. You go figure. By the way..."  
  
"Mistmon's fine. He's up already in case you haven't noticed." Lars nodded slowly, trying to let the message sink in as if he didn't believe it and sure enough, Mistmon was sitting around with them, looking reluctant to eat but fine nonetheless. He seemed to have noticed Lars and smiled, his pallid face showing his features against the sunlight. Nina was right next to him, trying to stuff a fish down his throat and lamenting on how he should eat more and nearly wrestled Kumamon for the last berry. Quite an 'adventurous' and highly amusing morning.  
  
In the afternoon, they were discussing on what to do next. They don't know who sent Daemon and they can't possibly just walk all around the world without knowing much information. Just then, Lucifer piped up about an unknown place.  
  
"Anyone tried the Shrieking Shack?" everyone blinked at the virus digimon except Bee and Black.  
  
"Let me get this straight; I don't think I know about this Shrieking Shack thing." Lucifer, Bee and Black exchanged glances and gave each other mental explanations before moving on to inform the rest.  
  
"Okay, the Shrieking Shack is full of informative digimon but, the hard thing is that they don't spill the beans too easily. Besides, the whole place is a dimensional vortex. If anyone gets lost, not much chance of finding that person in the Shrieking Shack anymore and you may end up warped somewhere in the digi-world." Bee explained, picking up a stick and roughly describing it on the ground.  
  
"Question; does the warping involve digi-hell?" Renamon asked, though it was Jennifer's question.  
  
"This IS the digi-hell. Nobody noticed so far?" all of them turned around and saw another Beelzemon (hey, makes that a crowd of Beelzemons, right?) looking at them from his seated position. He was grinning widely at them. Kimber stood up and looked at him intently.  
  
"Hey there Kim. Don't tell me you forgot li'l ol' me." He said, smiling.  
  
"...Rouge? Is that you?" he nodded. Behind her, both E-vie and Lars exchanged glances. She went up to the older digimon and practically pounced on him.  
  
"Rouge!! It IS you!!! You're back! But... I thought..." he shushed her and told her,  
  
"We just didn't like staying cooped up so we wreaked havoc. We really made them hopping mad so they expelled us to this hell." Rouge said, standing up. He didn't change much.  
  
"And, you must be Lucifer." He looked at Lucifer who just nodded simply. When he saw E-vie and Lars, it took him a while before he asked,  
  
"And these two are...?" Rico looked up at him and back at Lars.  
  
"Okay, father," he pointed up at Rouge,  
  
"Son." He pointed back at Lars.  
  
"Catch my drift yet? And before I forget, father, meet daughter." He said, pointing at E-vie. Rouge felt his jaw drop. The last time he had seen the two, they were still eggs and now, they're both in their Mega forms. Both were looking at him, equally surprised. Rouge straightened up and turned to the others,  
  
"You guys were planning on going to Shrieking Shack, right? First, you have to get past a 'few' of it's 'protectors'. Anyone heard of the Elemental of the Digi-world?" all digimons nodded.  
  
"Good. So, you need to defeat the Fire, water, ice, wind, earth, light and darkness. And... there's another elemental. It's called the memory elemental. I don't know what it does but, I might be lucky enough to help you guys. Unfortunately, I have to go and pick someone up first." Before he walked to his bike, he went over to Lars and E-vie,  
  
"Look out for each other. Every time you defeat an Elemental, one of you lot's gonna disappear."  
  
"Why aren't you telling the others about this?" Lars said, raising an eyebrow.  
  
"Because... Beelzemons and ...VampBeelzemons are the only ones who wouldn't get affected. Every time one elemental is defeated, a small portion of the dimensional vortex opens. And that little has the power to suck in one person. Should someone be in there, they'd never see the light of day, ever." Rouge said before standing up and speeding off.  
  
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FINALLY DONE!!!!  
  
Lars: yeah, and you choose now for dad to meet us...  
  
Oh well, gotta upload this. Next chap's spoiler!!!  
  
Spoiler: Heather's gonna re-unite with her Daemon and they all meet up at the Fire elemental's place!!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	4. Get Ready for Flame Lord!

The Rise and Fall-chapter 4  
  
Sorry 4 the delay 'coz I lost all my files and had to re- write this chapter. :P Ah well, I think this version sounds better anyway!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! OR ELSE I'LL SIC RABID MANIACAL CHIPMUNKS AT YOU AND YOU AND YOU AND YOUUUU!!!!!  
  
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A dark figure was bowing before a shadowed form and from the faint light of candles showed the dark digimon as the Daemon who had brainwashed Mistmon. Sweat dotted his unseen face and he purposely lowered his hood and his face until no one could see his face.  
  
"...You disappoint me, Daemon. I thought you would have done better than this, only IF you want your Tamer to live." He said darkly as Daemon shuddered at the sound of his 'master's voice.  
  
"I... I was outnumbered." Came the quiet reply. It seemed like the man in front of him wasn't taking what he said as an answer. He snapped his fingers and a cage suddenly appeared a few good meters away from the digimon. Inside, a girl was imprisoned. She looked out at the Daemon in front of her and called,  
  
"Dae!" before she could reach her hand out or her Daemon to rush by her side, a barrier stopped both of them. As what Daemon had expected, a Necromamon was standing, leaning against a pillar and glaring coldly at both of them.  
  
"Daemon, I shall give you one more chance. But this one chance shall be your last." Daemon nodded slowly, not daring to utter another word but before he was allowed to leave, his 'master' spoke again.  
  
"But, this time I will make SURE you do as you are told. Necromamon, do it." The Necromamon nodded grimly and strode over to Daemon, sword and staff in both hands. Just as suddenly as the barrier earlier on, Daemon was unable to move, disabled.  
  
"...This will be a lot of fun..." it said, smirking from under its cowl. Somehow, Daemon felt horrified. He knew he was stronger than the black mage but, the eerie air around it overwhelmed him. Necromamon switched his sword to a stabbing position and positioned it very close to Daemon's heart. The girl was screaming from her cage by now. Even though she was pleading as loudly as she could to make the dark wizard stop, it was unmoved. In a sudden move, he drove the sword right through the demon, both screams of a digimon and a human tearing the air between them.  
  
Necromamon smiled at his 'patient', who was currently howling in pain and made him yell louder by forcefully pulling the black sword out of him.  
  
"Your blood shall be your promise. Now, it won't hurt unless... you close your mind to me." Necromamon said, whispering right into Daemon's ear.  
  
He had made a curse under where Daemon was standing without the demon noticing and recited curse by curse, making sure this time, he wasn't able to escape it.  
  
Meanwhile!! The digi-destined took a hike near an Otamamon's lake, where they acted quite strangely by just floating around like dead tadpoles and not caring whether or not they were being insulted or getting things thrown at them. Tosh however took advantage of this and asked, throwing another pebble at an Otamamon,  
  
"Okay, first thing's first; where're we goin'? Rouge didn't tell us anything!"  
  
"The Elementals are usually found where their source of power is. For example, the fire elemental is somewhere where there is intense heat." Nina folded her arms, put one finger to her forehead and pulled a face as if she was trying to pull something out of her head.  
  
"Just a stupid question, where are we?" Ronfar took a look behind them at a mountain with smoke coming out of the top.  
  
"Uh... a volcano! ...Wait, am I missing anything here?" All of them sighed and face-faulted while Mistmon just laughed nervously.  
  
Inside the volcano, it was VERY hot!!! Lars and E'vie actually had to take off their jackets.  
  
"So how are we going to find our way in?" E'vie asked, tying her hair into a high ponytail so it would be a wee bit cooler which is impossible in the volcano. Kotemon looked around and saw a small cave big enough to fit one person at a time.  
  
"There's a cave there! Let's go and have a look!" They all followed the little kendo digimon and when they reached there, Rico poked his head into it.  
  
"It leads up. Who can go up and check before we all go?" Kotemon volunteered, although Tosh wouldn't allow him at first but allowed him to anyway. Kotemon squeezed in easily and when he reached the top, he examined the area and slid back down.  
  
"What did you see?" Tosh asked as the kendo digimon brushed its long sleeves as there was some dirt on them.  
  
"The place is safe. There's still some lava pools though. We'll just have to be careful. There are some mini cones up there and they might blow if you step on them. Oh and the tunnel gets a bit narrower once you get to the top." Kotemon explained. They all nodded. Both Kimber and Rico climbed up first with slight difficulties, followed by Wick, Wyna, Lars and E'vie as Rookies , Jennifer couldn't because her hip was too wide, Tosh managed, even though his shoulders hurt as they were broad, Ronfar had to squeeze in but couldn't and ended up getting stuck.  
  
"What're we gonna do now...?" Ronfar whimpered, his shoulders hurting even more by the minute. Rico scratched the back of his head.  
  
"We'll have to leave you here. We'll be back so don't worry." Rico assured him. He was sure the rest could hear him. He nudged his younger sister as they explored the area some more.  
  
"I wonder if mom and the rest will be back to normal..." Kimber wondered, walking closer to her brother. He knew how she felt and wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close to him so she could hear him whisper,  
  
"They will. Knowing mom, she'll find a way on how to change back to normal." Kimber nodded and walked on, not noticing that they were being watched.  
  
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They reached the top and was greeted by a fiery gijinka digimon. Fiery hands rested atop the hilt of a flame saber and a handsome face looked at them, displeased.  
  
'Why have you come?' a strong and regal voice boomed but the digimon in front of them barely moved his lips.  
  
"We come to open one of the gates to the Shrieking Shack." Rico said boldly, although the mere presence of the digimon and a simple glance of his fiery red eyes was enough to give him the jitters.  
  
'Shrieking Shack? That is an insult to the Sacred Sanctuary!' the digimon said, glaring at the teenager. If looks could kill, Rico would have been sprawled on the floor, dead by now. A flash from his angered red eyes caused the whole volcano to quake a bit.  
  
'Since you won't leave, then so be it! I, Flame Lord, shall end your miserable lives right here!!!' Flame Lord stood up and stood in a battle stance, ready for battle.  
  
Will they succeed to release the first gate of the Sacred Sanctuary?  
  
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Ehehehe... here's one question to Myotismon fans!!! How many times did I use the word 'here'? If you manage to get all of them from the fic, you will receive a pic of Myotismon plus more reviews from ME!!! How 'bout it? Don't worry, I'll grab a real cute one for you out there! ^_^  
  
Impmon: sheesh... next chapter's quiz will be for BlackWarGreymon fanatics/fans. Stay tuned for the 'Great' TyrantFlame's 5th chapter of... Rise and Fall!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	5. Gate of Fire completed

The Rise and Fall-chapter 5  
  
To Iniora: Okay, we'll see how it works in here! Let's not forget one new ally in the team! (everyone will meet in chapter 6.)  
  
Regina and Rena: ^^; you were with the Vamp jerk? Heck, he's better off turning into a Myotismon! _ And one thing for sure, E'vie's not a vixen, she's a vamp!  
  
1) Vamp= a girl who values herself highly.  
  
2) Vamp=VAMPIRE!!!!  
  
BTW, the above two words are to be told off to VampBeelzemon. (Not E'vie!)  
  
Blackmage718: Nope, he won't die that easily! Necromamon is still weaker than him, remember? (of course, Wick is stronger than Dae in HIS Necromamon form. :P)  
  
A-chan is missing... NOT!!!! SHE IS THE WINNER FOR THE MYOTISMON QUIZ!!!!!!!! Congratulations! GIVE HER A HAND, FOLKS!!!(lone applause can be heard) ... never mind... (hears blackmage clapping and cries tears of joy and muttering that someone is actually listening to her)  
  
Corran: whee...!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! when're you gonna upload? Huh? Huh? HUH??????? Okay, I'll lay it off till next time...  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
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Flame Lord picked up the heavy flame saber from the ground, the red blade bursting into flames as energy rippled from the master of fire before them. Bee and Black stood in front of Nina and signaled her to get ready.  
  
"...Spirit digivolution, is it not?" Flame Lord asked, his silky voice floating around the room.  
  
"Good guess. But, you won't stand a chance against us!" Bee said, shaking a fist at Flame Lord. Kimber mouthed something at Nina,  
  
'How'd you guys get here? Where're the others?'  
  
'...Long story kiddo. Bee and Black here made a hole in the ceiling and Lucifer helped us up here. The rest are fine...' she said, focusing on the enemy in front of them. By that time, Bee and Black had finished Digivolving to Chaos Lord as he wielded the dark sword he owned and pointed it in front of the Lord of flames.  
  
"Are you ready to lose?" Chaos Lord said mockingly as Flame Lord shut his eyes and sighed.  
  
"Arrogance is a major obstacle you will have to face if you want to fight properly. The great Chaos Lord won't attack as rashly as you would," he said quietly as he suddenly disappeared and reappeared behind the regal digimon, sword in hand,  
  
"IF you know what I mean. Reign of Fire!!" he swung the blade to meet the Chaos digimon's head but missed by inches as Chaos Lord turned, pointing his glowing shield and smirking at the young digimon.  
  
"On the contrary." He said as a beam of red light hit Flame Lord squarely, without any means of defense as where the great flame digimon stood exploded with a dark energy. Chaos Lord smiled triumphantly when suddenly, his smile faltered.  
  
Meanwhile, in a dark place, a Necromamon was thrown to a wall, where a crack was formed in the shape of the necromancer was left as he groaned and looked up at the wounded demon who was currently trying to break some of the supporting curses. A small trail of blood ran from one side of his head as he glared at Daemon. He picked himself up and his staff as well and strode towards the demon once more when something pulled his leg and he fell. He glared angrily at his 'assailant' and saw a Clowmon, lying face- down on the floor and its feet still on the unicycle.  
  
"Master Neck-cracker-mon, Clowmon came over here to tell you that Master Piedmon told me to tell you..." it was cut off.  
  
"Get to the point!!" he bellowed, earning a squeak and a gulp from Clowmon.  
  
"*eep!!* Well... Master Piedmon said he wants you to bring the girl to him." Necromamon looked up at the evil man for agreement and received a nod of approval.  
  
"Fine. Take her. And next time, stick it to that brain of yours that my name is Ne-cro-ma-mon." he said, kicking the jester away, who unlocked the cage and smiled sweetly at her.  
  
"Hi! I'm Clowmon. What's yours?" it said as it tied her wrists a bit loosely, since it couldn't tie a pair of shoelaces. The girl looked at it strangely before answering,  
  
"H...Heather."  
  
"Ooooooh... Heather! Nice..." it was about to say something else when Necromamon interrupted,  
  
"YOU GET HER TO PIEDMON OR ELSE!!!!" Another 'eep!' and both were off.  
  
In the corridor, Clowmon really took his time getting to know Heather.  
  
"So... Heather thinks what Clowmon is doing is bad?"  
  
"Of course! Besides, why are you working here in the first place?" Clowmon found this hard to answer and pondered a bit and sighed sadly.  
  
"Clowmon was taken away from his village. He was the only survivor and scary Master Nook-croaker-mon took him in." he said, pulling the rope gently as a gesture for Heather to keep up with him.  
  
"...Where are we going and why are we going in circles?" Heather asked, getting uneasy.  
  
"Clowmon wants to ask for something." He said suddenly, looking at Heather.  
  
"And that is...?"  
  
"...Clowmon wants to be free. He wants to get out of here and live normally. He doesn't want to be tortured every day with scary spells and... and... weapons..." he said, his voice cracking and shaky. Light blue tears rolled down the clown's cheek and even the masked part of its face seemed like it was crying.  
  
"Alright. If you help me and Daemon out of here, I'll help you in any way I can. Deal?" she asked, hoping the clown wasn't a very good actor to touch her feelings so easily. Strangely, he wasn't acting!  
  
"How can Clowmon thank you! Here, follow him!" he said as he untied the ropes and hurried down a staircase, Heather close behind.  
  
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A black bike skidded to a halt in front of an old castle, once strong, now ruins. Even in ruins, it still has a regal look to it. The biker smiled and dismounted his bike and strode to the door, knocking before the door swung open without anyone in sight. He quirked an eyebrow and stepped inside, the door slamming shut behind him.  
  
"Alara, you've got five minutes before we leave." He said, looking around the huge room, seeing if she was around. He heard echoes of 'I'm coming!' from upstairs and was expecting to hear heels on the floor but heard nothing. He took a step forwards and something fell from the ceiling. With a quick reflexive move, he caught it, as it was Alara. She giggled when she saw the look on his face.  
  
"Rouge, Rouge, Rouge... You can't seem to hear me flying, can't you?" she said, tapping his chin. He rolled his eyes skywards and sighed.  
  
"You almost gave me a heart attack there, y'know?" she laughed, still cradled in Rouge's powerful arms and replied,  
  
"I didn't know you can actually get a heart attack! And, do you mind? I can walk on my own two feet." She said as-a-matter-of-factly. A mischievous grin formed on Rouge's face as he tossed her around, not giving her much time to actually spread her wings.  
  
"Rouge!! Put me down! Put me down, now!!!" she shrieked as Rouge laughed on the ground. He caught her one last time and set her on the floor when she leaned onto him for support.  
  
"Ugh... I feel sick..." she said, slightly turning a shade of green. She turned to him and poked him in the chest.  
  
"And it's all YOUR fault, dummy." He just shrugged, still grinning as widely as ever.  
  
"Well, we have to take care of some things, anyway. We ready to go? Or do you need to refresh your make-up?" she whacked his back real hard as a reply. He yelped and rubbed the spot where she had hit him, which was something useless since he couldn't reach it.  
  
"Very funny, Rouge..."  
  
"Oh. Come on! I was just joking." He said as they both walked out, just in time to see the area turning to ice.  
  
"Looks like we have company."  
  
"The Snow priestess has arrived."  
  
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From the explosion caused by Chaos Lord's attack, stood Flame Lord unscratched. A small ring of fire circled around his body, almost like an attack amplifier more than that of defense. (think FF8's save point.) Chaos Lord was speechless. No digimon had ever survived that attack unscratched and he was looking at the first one. Flame Lord advanced to him slowly, raising his blade as it erupted into flames.  
  
"Reign of..." he couldn't finish his sentence as a shadow-like digimon struck the fiery digimon's side, although it was stopped by a fire barrier. Flame Lord turned to look at the digimon. The Hybrid digivolution of Wizardmon; Shadowmon. The shadow digimon prepared another attack, a black sphere in his hand.  
  
'...Shadowmon...' Flame Lord looked around, seeing he was surrounded by Lucifer, Wyna as Remmon, Chaos Lord, E'vie and Lars and Wick as Shadowmon.  
  
"Give it up, Flame Lord! We'll open the Sacred Sanctuary no matter what!" Rico yelled, as Flame Lord glared at the young boy.  
  
"You will not. I swear on behalf of the Gate I guard!!!" Flame Lord yelled, erupting in flames, trying to knock the others off their feet. He succeeded however and dashed in Lucifer's direction first. He managed to cast Shell of Darkness but the powerful strike of Flame Lord's 'Infernal Sword' broke it and Lucifer was knocked out cold. He back-flipped right behind Remmon and struck her as well and was about to move on to E'vie when his assault was stopped by her brother.  
  
"Lay a finger on her and you're dead meat." Lars growled, picking Flame Lord by the collar. Flame Lord looked into Lars' eyes lazily when something pierced through Lars' chest. The burning sword had embedded itself into the Virus but to his surprise, Lars wasn't deleted. He may be fading out but, he kept on re-materializing. Taking this chance, Chaos Lord, Shadowmon and Remmon brandished each of their weapons and struck Flame Lord in three different directions. Caught off guard, Flame Lord was surprised. Surprised to be defeated by mere hybrids. (save Chaos Lord) The flame digimon sank to his knees and fell face first onto the heated earth below him. Remmon started coughing blood from the previous blow she took as Shadowmon went over to her.  
  
"The gate's not open yet. He's not giving up." Chaos Lord said, looking down on the seemingly unconscious mon. To his and everyone's surprise, they heard a low chuckle. The bloodied digimon on the floor turned, barely able to stop himself from falling flat on his back and looked up at Chaos Lord through glazed eyes.  
  
"It'll take... more than three hybrids... to get rid of me and make me open the gate of Flames!" He managed to stagger up to his feet, blood flowing out of the deep wound in his gut. Suddenly, a cool rush of wind entered. It felt refreshing, like being underwater.  
  
"...Wendiene..." Flame Lord muttered under his breath and listened to the soft wind. He smiled. He let go of the flame saber he held in his left hand and fell back once more before disappearing in a swirl of flames. Suddenly, the place became surprisingly hot and a portal opened in front of them, taking in anything within its reach. E'vie spread her wings to stop the rest from getting sucked into the portal and Chaos Lord was holding onto both Lucifer and Nina.  
  
"What's going on!?" Rico yelled over the loud wind. The hot air circled around them and because of the intense heat, Chaos Lord had to let go of one of his hands. Unfortunately, it was where Nina was holding on to.  
  
"NINA!!!!!!" The spirit-digivolved digimon yelled as their tamer disappeared into the portal and it finally closed once more.  
  
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Bee sank to his knees and pounded on the floor, feeling very guilty. Black was at the edge of being in a mental blocking state and Lucifer wouldn't talk to anyone. He even blocked out his other two companions.  
  
"...She's still alive. I can feel it." Wick suddenly said, glowing a pale purple colour. The other three weren't listening to him.  
  
"I sure hope you're right, Wick. They won't budge." Rico said, looking at the three digimon. Wick took one look at them and sighed.  
  
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Somewhere in an unknown dimension, Nina couldn't see nor hear anything.  
  
'...Where am I...?' she opened her eyes slowly and turned her head very slightly to see a very bright ceiling. It didn't look like a ceiling at all, more like a hole which was on top of a bottomless pit. A regal figure floated towards her and held her hand. It felt so familiar... she suddenly felt very tired and closed her eyes once more.  
  
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"Can't believe you took her here!"  
  
'...Who...? Or what... was that...?'  
  
"This is none of your business, Bolt. Now, I want you out of this room."  
  
"But..."  
  
"Out." The simple cold reply warded off the second person in the room with the sound of a whip of lightning. Nina opened her eyes and saw blinding lights. She hastily shut them as someone approached her.  
  
"You're awake at last."  
  
"...Who're you? And... where am I...?" Nina said slowly.  
  
"I am Chaos Lord. And you are in the land of the Forgotten Kings." (I'm really sorry I can't put in the word 'God', Iniora. Pls understand... I'm a Muslim and we Muslims believe that there is only one God which is Allah so it is against our religion to even put this in.) Nina turned to the direction of the voice and looked at the digimon next to her. It wasn't Bee and Black. The two troublemakers have amber eyes but now, she was looking at gentle, icy blue eyes.  
  
"The land of... WHAT!?!?!?!?!"  
  
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WRAP IT UP!!! WRAP IT UP!!!!  
  
Lars: Wrapping!  
  
E'vie: long delay is caused by the exam season so, please forgive our authress as she is suffering from mental block.  
  
...Put ur rite foot in, put ur right foot out... (does the hokey-pokey)  
  
Rouge: Well, uh... Guess we gotta continue next week then... hope u like it.  
  
R,L,E: PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	6. Tears of ice

Rise and Fall- chapter 6  
  
Thanx for the reviews!!!  
  
Iniora: Cool chapter 9 there, bub! Okay, you shall be Sergeant Iniora! ^_^ Good job describing Zedo! ^_^ (swoons and drools)  
  
Blackmage718: ^_^ MORE YOU HERE!!!  
  
Regina Girl and Rena: ...He's definitely a jerk then. And I was starting to think long jackets are kewl... (sigh)  
  
Okay; BlackWarGreymon fans!!! You will receive a pic of BlackWarGreymon if you get the question right and make sure you leave your e-mail address or else I won't be able to send it to you!!  
  
Question: Estimate to the nearest whole number, how many words are there in this chapter all in all. If you can give the exact amount, you will receive a free pic of Scalumon!!! (What kinda present is this...???)  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
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The digi-destines were trying to find a way out when Nina's three digimon just found out through their mental links that Nina was still alive in a dimension called The land of the Forgotten Kings. Wick flashed a triumphant smile behind his cowl and when they explained that Nina was with Chaos Lord in the other dimension, Lars huffed. Being with one Chaos Lord is bad enough, why bother meeting another?  
  
"Okay, now we know Nina's alive, which is good news, how are we going to get out?" Rico asked, pacing. As if on cue, a hole opened not far from them as Ronfar's face popped up from behind it.  
  
"Yo! Thought you guys might want a clean exit!" Ronfar waved at them. Rico merely smirked.  
  
"Okay, let's head out. We'll figure out what to do next later." The 'captain' said when Lars frowned as if something hit his head.  
  
"...Once you head out, head for the mountains. I will wait for you there." Lars said. His voice sounded different and when E-vie looked at him, his eyes were glowing a shade of yellow instead of his green ones and after he said that, he fell unconscious.  
  
"...Why do we have to wait for him if he's already with us?"  
  
"Shut up, Ronfar." Rico said as he walked out through the hole in the wall, pocketing a red sphere which Firenze had left behind after the flame digimon had been defeated.  
  
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Meanwhile, the ground was already covered in ice where Rouge and Alara were. Alara shivered slightly while Rouge was looking for the source of the ice.  
  
"It's pretty cold and I'm getting sleepy." Alara said, looking at Rouge. Rouge smiled, chuckling to himself.  
  
"Better not. If you fall asleep and freeze into a block of ice, then maybe I'd take a rest myself. ...The eternal type." He said, cocking his head to one side as he looked up into the sky. Alara's cheeks flushed an interesting shade of pink.  
  
"Don't be silly! I won't let you, that's for sure!" she said, punching him playfully on the shoulder when suddenly, Rouge pulled her by the waist towards him and where she stood was an ice pillar.  
  
"Thanks." She said briefly when all around them, an ice room was formed.  
  
"Things are looking bad." She commented.  
  
"Very bad." Rouge added when they heard a cheerful yet cold giggle.  
  
"Sodina, how nice to see you." Alara said warmly, knowing the Ice Priestess would be delighted if she said it coldly. In turn, Sodina noticed the sarcasm in her voice.  
  
"Oh and I thought you were being sarcastic." She said, forming ice spikes on the ground.  
  
"And what did we do to deserve this?" Rouge said calmly, stuffing his hands in his pockets. Even though he looked quite normal, he was actually shivering from head to toe.  
  
"Well, merely an order to stop your children's advance. So... I decided I should go and talk to the parents first." She said brightly, playing with some snowflakes.  
  
"What luck, we were going to go see you. That way, we can open more gates easily." Alara said, hands on her hip.  
  
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"Clowmon, how much farther are we going? It's getting darker here." Heather said, still following the clown down some steps.  
  
"Don't worry Heather, he knows what to do." Clowmon said, looking for something around the walls.  
  
"He who?" from the dim light, she saw Clowmon pointing to himself.  
  
"He knows shadows will lead him to Daemon."  
  
"Just hopefully he's alright."  
  
Upstairs, Daemon was struggling to release himself from the curses which were binding him.  
  
"And now, the final step..." Necromamon opened his palm to reveal a black ball, glowing menacingly. Daemon looked at it for a minute and recognized it for sure.  
  
"That's a Black Gear..." he muttered under his breath. Suddenly, there was a war cry and the Viral Army was set loose on Necromamon. Coincidentally, Necromamon accidentally opened the binds as the Viral Army continued to bash him up. Daemon raised an eyebrow, wondering how the Viral Army was set loose when someone tugged him out of the castle through the back door which led them to a mountain.  
  
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In the Sacred Sanctuary, Bolt had awakened. From his beastly form of a blue griffin, he took shape of a human. Blue hair, deep purple eyes and was quite pale. He was dressed in a blue outfit and heard the door behind him open. It was Wendiene, the Water guardian.  
  
"What do you want?" he asked rather harshly. Wendiene looked down at the scales on her tail as if she was a guilty person and looked up at him.  
  
"Bolt, is this really necessary...? I mean, I don't want anyone to be hurt again! Firenze is hurt badly enough and my younger sister Sodina is out to stop their advance. If you too are injured, the gates will all be opened at the Sacred Sanctuary would be free to be attacked from any directions." She said, looking into those lazy purple eyes with concerned aqua eyes. He looked away from her and turned. He took a deep breath and sighed. When he turned to face her again, he walked right past her and said something as he passed her.  
  
"The gates won't be opened. I won't allow them to advance to your gate. Or Memoria..." he said silently as he disappeared with a crack of lightning in the corridor.  
  
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The blizzard had stopped to a mere rain of snow and soon, not a single snowflake was present in the air as Sodina fell down to the ground, defeated. Rouge too, fell back from exhaustion. Alara caught him in time before they heard Sodina weeping tears of ice.  
  
"...I... couldn't defend my gate... They will never forgive me..." she cried, as the ice around them slowly began to melt. She too, began to melt, her long hair growing shorter and her hands slowly turning into pools of water. Alara looked at the melting guardian and couldn't help but feel sorry for her. Sodina wailed and with a wave of her slowly but surely disappearing hands, her gate opened, taking her with it. In Sodina's place, lay a light blue sphere. She picked it up and Rouge sat up, rubbing the back of his neck.  
  
"Remind me not to do that again..." he muttered. She gave him a faint smile as she walked towards him.  
  
"Everything is repeating itself again... The Ice guardian perishes, as her descendants were doomed to suffer such fate." She said slowly, putting the ball inside her pocket. Rouge knew what she meant and nodded.  
  
"But, I won't disappear this time. I know I won't." Rouge said, standing up and smiling at her. Alara was trembling, visibly upset as he wrapped his arms around her to comfort her.  
  
"Did you realize what you put me through before...?" she cried into his shoulder. He gave a ghost of a smile and sighed,  
  
"Yes, I knew. And I'm sorry. Very sorry."  
  
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What're they talking about? Heheheheh... wait 'till I finish DYSR... Where right now, I am completely stumped!!!!! _  
  
Oh well, QUIZZIE!!!!! To the closest hundreds, estimate how many words there are in this chapter. If you can give me the correct amount, you will get one pic of BlackWarGreymon but should you give me the exact amount, you will receive a pic of Scalumon along with BlackWarGreymon! (as I said, what kinda present is this...?)  
  
HINT!!!!!!  
  
There are four numbers in how many words there are.  
  
Do not count the author's note or the footer.  
  
Do not count the @@@@@ line.  
  
There you go!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	7. Loss

Rise and Fall-chapter 7  
  
To blackmage718: I'm really sorry, black but, ur answer is wrong. Oh well, try and get something in this next quiz! ^_^  
  
To Iniora: Well, I was hoping you'd get creative and cause a commotion back in the S.S area. You know, Nina meeting Firenze and the other Elementals...  
  
To Rembrant: YAY!!! THE WINNER!!!!!! ^________^ CONGRATS, REM! Hopefully you'll join us in this chapter too!  
  
Okay, the quiz will be set up at the bottom of the page!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
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When Heather reached the foot of the mountain, near the entrance of a forest, they had to stop and take a break. Daemon was in a coughing fit at the moment and he was coughing up a lot of blood. Heather bent down to look at Daemon and met the demon's yellow eyes. The injured digimon was gasping for air as he had been coughing his throat off. Even though Daemon was a Mega-leveled Virus, he couldn't withstand too much energy or else he would explode from absorbing too much.  
  
"Dae! Just... hang in there! You'll be alright..." she said, hugging the digimon. He rested his head on her forearm and was about to rest a bit when Clowmon shoved them aside using a long and wide piece of ribbon.  
  
"Look out!!!" unfortunately, the ribbon he used caught fire and soon got to his gloved-covered hand. The clown digimon screamed as he tried in a vain attempt to stop the fire from spreading to his body. An Agnimon had caught up with them and looked at the small group of three.  
  
"Finally. You three caused me enough trouble. Especially you." The tall fire digimon said, glaring at Clowmon.  
  
"Too bad you won't be able to escape, if that happens, we'll be one specimen short." Agnimon said, shrugging. Just then, Clowmon did something unexpected. He cut off the threads that held his burnt arm to his shoulder and stood up in front of Agnimon, his other arm extended protectively as if shielding the other two behind him.  
  
"I won't let you." Clowmon said, not in his usual tone. He sounded quite different as he allowed Agnimon to punch him in the face. But, he had wanted Agnimon to do it. It broke the mask on the other half of the clown's face and ribbons surrounded the clown. When the ribbons disappeared, a monster emerged from the centre. It wasn't the Clowmon Heather knew. It stood on two legs, one different than the other, one arm with a claw and the other abnormally long with vine-like fingers at the end. Instead of its former blue eyes, they were now white and red. And most of its body was covered in stitches as if it were torn apart and stitched together again.  
  
"What the...?" Agnimon raised an eyebrow at the new digimon. It cackled and pounced on Agnimon, driving its clawed fist through Agnimon's shoulder. The fire digimon gritted his teeth and shoved the clown off and got to his feet. Agnimon threw a fireball at Heather and before he knew it, Clowmon was already in front of it, catching the fireball with its rag-like body.  
  
"Clowmon!" Heather cried as it turned to look at her with its red left eye.  
  
"Heather... run! Don't mind me!!" Agnimon was about to attack once more when Clowmon unexpectedly stopped him again.  
  
"What are you waiting for!? GO NOW!!!!" The clown pleaded, trying to hold the Mega-level fire digimon. Heather was at a loss. Daemon, using the last of his strength, lifted Heather off the ground and teleported to a safer area. Clowmon smiled and faced Agnimon.  
  
"It's just you and me now..." the clown growled. Agnimon tripped the clown, knocking it off balance and stomped on the clown's abdomen, earning a piercing shriek of pain from his prey.  
  
"You ought to know what will happen to those who try to stop me in my tracks... NOW DIE!!!!" In a flurry of fiery punches and kicks, Clowmon was ripped apart, limb by limb. The pain was excruciating and as he was receiving his punishment, Heather crossed the clown's mind once more.  
  
"Heather... seems like I'll never achieve my dreams of being free..." And now, around Agnimon was nothing but pieces of the former clown's body breaking into data bits.  
  
"Hmph... what a waste of time... and now, I have to go out there and look for that stupid demon..." Agnimon muttered, grumbling all the way.  
  
In a clearing at the foot of the mountain, Daemon collapsed in Heather's arms.  
  
"Dae!!" she shook the demon, hoping he wasn't going to leave her side as Clowmon had. Her response was Daemon holding her wrists.  
  
"...H-Heather... Stop it... It...hurts..." he said softly as Heather did as she was told. She rested the demon's head on her lap and looked into the dark depths under the demon's hood where his face was. Yellow eyes slowly disappeared into the darkness as the demon decided to rest until the next time he would wake. Once he has the energy.  
  
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The kids went on a rough hike when they met up with a lot of troublesome digimon. They had their backs against each other to prevent any back attacks while fighting when they saw the area around their enemies turn very dark.  
  
"Jaque Rue!" came a rough spell. The shadows around their enemies turned into a scythe-wielding demon and slashed their heads off. They turned and saw a familiar face.  
  
"Witchmon!" the said witch looked up at them sternly and smirked. She certainly looked different than before. Her clothes were even more tattered than before, signifying she had been in more battles to survive than they did.  
  
"I see we meet again..." she said, taking one look at them and looked away suddenly.  
  
"Seems like you didn't need my help with your type of company." She said as she eyed Black, Bee and Lucifer especially.  
  
"You're wrong. We really need your help right now..." E-vie piped up, walking towards Witchmon. The witch looked up at the female Beelzemon lazily and said,  
  
"He doesn't need help. How do I know? Well, ask yourself. Do I look like a liar to you?" she said mockingly, pointing at her face at the last question. She certainly became even crankier than before.  
  
"Hear me out. The gate to the Real World is getting even bigger now. If it grows any bigger, it would surely swallow the Real World and my job would be even heavier from now on so I won't be able to help you any longer." She said, glaring at them. She looked at Bee again and said,  
  
"If you need a healer, then why don't you just ask 'Devil-to-be-Angel-Boy' to do it for you? Besides, I wasn't helping you just now. I only meant to tell you MoonMachinedramon is near completion if you guys don't move it!" she said harshly, motioning to Bee as she vanished into thin air. Everyone was at a loss. MoonMachinedramon? What was she talking about? Tosh looked up at the darkening sky and turned to the rest of the group.  
  
"You know, I think we'd better camp for the night... We are near the mountain after all." Everyone agreed to do so when something suddenly crossed Rico's mind.  
  
"Wait a sec... she said her job would be heavier... what did she mean by that? As far as I know, she's only protecting her territory." The rest looked at Rico and suddenly realized the exact same thing.  
  
"I have a bad feeling about this, guys... Whatever we do, we'd better head for the mountain before it gets too dark for us to even look at the road." They all agreed and continued to hike a bit more and on top of a cliff, they were being watched. Behind the cowl of a cape, a smirk formed on a witch's stitched lips.  
  
"Everything is going just as I planned..." with that, she vanished once more, as the moon grew fuller overhead, hidden slightly by clouds of the night.  
  
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In the Sacred Sanctuary, Nina was free to walk around as she pleases around the area, provided Chaos Lord is around her. Talk about protection... Zedomon, a Deva Guardian digimon had ordered Chaos Lord to do so. Amber, cat-like eyes, creamy complexion and flowing silver hair with matching attire would be how he is distinguished. Not to mention tall for a gijinka digimon.  
  
"Say Chaos Lord, is there a place around here whereby I can get info?" Nina said, looking around to see some grand digimon. Most were either Kings or Ancients. Chaos Lord raised an eyebrow.  
  
"You're walking in its boundary, Nina." Nina blinked a couple of times and looked up at Chaos Lord.  
  
"You've gotta be kidding me..."  
  
"I'm not. Why didn't you ask Zedomon since you think I'm lying?" he said playfully, now sounding a lot like Bee and Black. She pouted and dropped the subject. She was walking around and saw a mist-covered forest.  
  
"Say Chaos Lord, what's that place?" she pointed at the forest entrance and Chaos Lord followed.  
  
"Oh that. That is the Ancient Forest. Nobody goes there because of Ancient, the protector of the forest." Nina nodded and continued to sightsee but meanwhile, Zedomon was in a conferencing area with more high-ranked digimon. He closed the door behind him and sighed, looking up at the other digimons who were having an aerial discussion.  
  
"You are late, Zedomon." Catshuramon said, looking at the silver-clad deva disapprovingly. Zedomon merely shrugged and levitated upwards to meet the rest and was surprised to see a familiar someone right across him. As pale as death, clad in black and crimson from head to toe, neck-length blood red hair and a smirk you'd want to wipe off his face once and for all.  
  
"Neo Crimson. It's been a while." Zedomon said, nodding at the digimon, acknowledging his half-'brother'. The said digimon nodded at Zedomon, waving at the silver digimon with one finger and sitting casually in mid- air.  
  
"If I knew better, I'd rather be where I belong right now than waiting for Zhuqiaomon. Besides, the 'pressing matter' he had in mind wouldn't be affecting my area so why summon me?" Neo Crimson said, loud enough for Zedomon to hear him. Zedomon took his 'seat' and sighed, smiling.  
  
"Watch your mouth, Neo Crimson." Boomed a voice from above as Zhuqiaomon entered, changing from his beastly form of a phoenix to a smaller form of a human. He glared at Neo Crimson who just held his hands up to defend himself.  
  
"Now we're all here, what is it that you want to discuss?" Neo Crimson pulled a red knife out of thin air, every once in a while tempted to poke at the sharp tip. Zhuqiaomon merely looked at the blade and as suddenly as the knife appeared, Neo Crimson let go of it, feeling the blade grow white hot.  
  
"No weapons, if you please..." Zhuqiaomon hissed and again, Neo Crimson held his hands up in an apologetic, yet sarcastic gesture.  
  
"The portal from the Digital World to the Real World is growing bigger by the minute. I assume that you all know?" Zhuqiaomon inquired, earning nods from the small crowd of Lords and Devas. Neo Crimson smiled and stood up after everyone turned their attention to Zhuqiaomon and now their attention was diverted to Neo Crimson.  
  
"Excuse me." He said, half-raising an arm. Zhuqiaomon raised an eyebrow at him.  
  
"I know you all think this portal thing is important but unfortunately, this li'l problem is none of my business as it is not my field of expertise. Besides, the Crimson Nobles have never intended to assist anyone if their matters include the dimension between our world and the Real World. So, all I'm saying is, I wish to retreat to my castle and now, I wish for your permission, Zhuqiaomon." Neo Crimson smirked, cocking his head at Zhuqiaomon. This time, it was Zhuqiaomon's turn to smile.  
  
"What if I tell you the sole survivor of the Black Waltzes is assisting Elrond, a human who is reincarnating Machinedramon as MoonMachinedramon and is now heading this way? As you know, if the portal of our World is distorted through dimensions leading to the Real World, their first destination would be where the Crimson Nobles are." The smirk on Neo Crimson's face faded and he huffed. He levitated himself to the centre of the group and ran his tongue over his fangs as he looked at Zhuqiaomon.  
  
"...Sorry to burst your bubble. The Crimson Nobles have sealed the dimensional vortex to another place. For safety over any intrusion towards our territory, we Nobles have transported it over the Dark Ocean. That way, who or whatever digimon that enters would automatically fall into the Dark Ocean." He explained, the smirk on his face returned and he turned on his heel, facing the rest.  
  
"Has everyone forgotten the Nobles' ability to distort dimensions? I believe so. But, no matter how strong Witchmon's power is, even she from the powerful Black Waltzes wouldn't be able to escape the Dark Ocean." He raised an eyebrow and turned back to Zhuqiaomon, waiting for an answer. How bold could this arrogant Noble get?  
  
"Well? The best Witchmon could go with her magic would be killing herself while trying to escape the Dark Ocean and trying to survive one of the former Dark Masters, Daemon." (blackmage, this is another Daemon I'm talking about. Not yours.) Neo Crimson then brushed his bangs away from his face and continued.  
  
"With this Zhuqiaomon, I rest my case and now, I shall take my leave." He said and with a polite bow, sank down the floor as if he were a shadow and Zedomon didn't like the look in the Crimson's red eyes. Just then, Zhuqiaomon turned to Zedomon and said,  
  
"Zedomon, I trust you know Neo Crimson better than any of us do."  
  
"Huh?" Zedomon snapped out of his trance and looked at the phoenix. He looked at his hands and nodded.  
  
"Yes, I do. But, are the Nobles necessary for this?" Zedomon asked politely. Zhuqiaomon nodded.  
  
"I'm afraid so. They seem to be the only ones able to cast pain spells. And those are necessary to stop our enemies' advance." As Zhuqiaomon spoke, someone was listening outside. It was Neo Crimson. He hadn't returned to his palace and sighed, glaring at the white marble floor with disgust.  
  
"There are no more of the Nobles because I am the last of the Crimsons..." he growled and as if on cue, Zedomon stepped out of the room and caught the Crimson off guard. Zedomon clamped a hand over the Noble's shoulder and as he expected, the crimson-clad digimon jerked back and drew his knife to Zedomon's neck in reflex. Zedomon saw this coming and made a small barrier around his fingertip to push Neo's knife away from him. He looked into those lonely red eyes and saw the other digimon withdraw his knife.  
  
"What do you want?" he asked harshly as Zedomon merely shrugged.  
  
"Meeting's over. Might as well exit the room than just stay in there standing around like an idiot." Zedomon said calmly, walking ahead of Neo Crimson. The crimson digimon huffed and followed Zedomon into the main hall.  
  
"If it weren't for you, the Crimson Nobles might still be destroying the world now, Neo." Zedomon said as he looked up at the stained glass which had an abstract picture in it. Neo Crimson looked away from the silver deva and replied coldly,  
  
"...As much as I'd like to admit, I still put the blame to you, Zedomon. The Crimson Nobles were the supreme rulers and just because I was the 'once- in-a-blue-moon' born Noble, I had to seal away my own clan in my own castle..." he said, his tone with hints of sadness and pain as much as he'd like to hide it. Zedomon turned to the Crimson and smiled,  
  
"Trust me Neo. One day, the other Nobles would be free of their binds and would once again be normal." He was about to pat the other digimon on the shoulder when his companion drew his sword, making him withdraw his hand as to not make him a limb shorter.  
  
"Don't touch me. As far as I remembered, the jewels of the Nobles were taken away by someone and I only meant to join you so that I could retrieve it and rebuild my clan." He said, red eyes gleaming. Zedomon held his hands up in the gesture Neo Crimson did earlier and merely smiled. Then, he pointed at something on the other digimon's left ear.  
  
"You still have a shard of one of them."  
  
"A shard isn't good enough. Just a while ago, it was gleaming. That means someone has it and that person is nearby." He said, swinging his sword at Zedomon who easily dodged it by back flipping and landing gracefully on his feet. Feeling his blood boil, the Noble pointed his sword at Zedomon.  
  
"ZEDOMON!!! I know you're hiding something from me!! Where are they!!?" Neo Crimson yelled. Zedomon drew his sword and shook his head.  
  
"I don't know what you're talking about. Maybe you ought to ask Ancient." Just by mentioning the name earlier on, Neo Crimson froze and sheathed his sword and said through gritted teeth,  
  
"If I find that person, I swear I'd kill him... Whether you like it or not!" with that, he stormed off with a burst of red flames.  
  
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Meanwhile, Witchmon was on a ledge. A black portal was in front of her and she smiled, a scroll in one gloved hand.  
  
"Success. Now, we don't have to worry about falling into the Dark Ocean. No matter what happens, it will lead us to the Sacred Sanctuary. If they think the Black Waltzes were stupid, they were wrong... VERY wrong..." she said, looking into the portal. Some black mirrors surrounded her and she started chanting a spell.  
  
"Black mirrors of the Waltzes, show to me where the holy and the Sacred reside. The holy place known as the Sacred Sanctuary!" The mirrors around her gleamed an eerie shade and black lightning bolted out of them. Behind her, a whole army of Dark-type, Mega-leveled digimon waited, each growling as their patience grew thinner. Suddenly, the mirrors around Witchmon shattered and she nearly toppled over as she panted and as her breathing grew normal, she turned to the rest.  
  
"Now, we shall begin our assault! Warp Zone! Portal of Darkness! Show us the way to the Sacred Sanctuary!!" a larger portal opened in front of them as they entered, ready to attack at any time...  
  
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Well, that's a load off! ^_^ NINA!!!! I mean, INIORA!!!! THIS IS WHAT YOU SHALL DO!!!!  
  
-Get Nina to meet Ancient.  
  
-Chaos Lord will be her guide.  
  
-START WORKING!!  
  
Okay, quiz, quiz, quiz...  
  
Question 1-  
  
Name both of Gallantmon's attacks in Digimon Rumble Arena.  
  
Question 2-  
  
In which Digimon World can you train your digimon?  
  
Question 3-  
  
Name any one Mega level digimon which is a Data type, Vaccine and Virus.  
  
Question 4-  
  
Is BlackWarGreymon born a digimon or was he created? If he was created, who or what created him?  
  
Question 5-  
  
Can Wizardmon in Digimon World 2 digivolve into its Ultimate level?  
  
Okay!!! Time to review/answer!! Best thing is, you review and answer if you want the prizes. Maybe I'll change them though...  
  
P/s: the first to get all correct will be the one to get the prize. Those after him or her who gets the answer correct will not get anything.  
  
P/s2: If anybody doesn't get any answers correct, you may request for a picture you really want. (Applies to everyone, just in case...)  
  
P/s3: Be sure to leave your e-mail addresses or else I won't be able to send them to you!!!  
  
P/s4:  
  
5 correct- Beelzemon. (Sorry black!!! _ I couldn't find Dae anywhere! But you can request!)  
  
4 correct- Wizardmon.  
  
3 correct- WereGarurumon.  
  
2 correct- Devimon.  
  
1 correct- Chuumon.  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
P/S5: Please check your e-mail in 2 to 3 days for your prizes, thank you! 


	8. Waves of Sorrow

Rise and Fall-chapter 8  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! (As usual, check the bottom of the fic to see if anything catches your interest!)  
  
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Rico and the others went to make camp at a clearing when they saw someone else setting up camp there. A girl around their age with long chestnut hair tied back in a neat ponytail and wearing dark clothes. A Daemon lay down on the ground next to her as she poked at the fire she had made.  
  
"Hey. Are you... alright?" Kimber asked, walking over to her. She snapped out of her trance and looked at the red-headed girl. She blinked a couple of times before opening her mouth to say something and the only thing that came out of her mouth was;  
  
"Are you... a human?" Kimber smiled and nodded. The girl brightened up and smiled.  
  
"I thought you were something else..."  
  
"Like what?" Kimber queried.  
  
"...Necromamon or something in disguise." She said quietly. From how she just spoke to them as if they knew each other, they could tell she was very depressed. Wick, overhearing only 'Necromamon' looked at Wyna and pointed at his face as if saying 'What did I do?'  
  
"Necromamon? Wick, did you do anything?" Rico said, looking down at the wizard close to his feet. The said wizard shook his head no vigorously and didn't stop until he felt his head spin and Rico stopping him from doing so. After a while, the girl let them set up camp around the area.  
  
"So your Daemon was injured because of some evil digimons?" Ronfar said, bending two of his fingers to make it look like a pair of bunny ears bending to every syllabus he said. (Make a 'V' and bend it twice. My friends like doing that.) She nodded. After a moment of silence, she spoke up.  
  
"Oh, I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Heather. And you guys are...?" after a lot of introductions and some history lessons, the Daemon next to her stirred from the noises they were making.  
  
"...Heather... Keep it down...! I wanna... sleep..." the demon murmured and quickly, Heather turned her attention to it. Wyna looked over the girl's shoulder and said,  
  
"What hit him? Looks like curse scars to me." The sorceress said, trying to get a better view of the demon. Heather nodded slowly and Wyna laughed.  
  
"Why didn't you say so?! I may be a Witchmon but that doesn't mean I lost my touch in healing!" she said and walked over to Daemon's side.  
  
"Okay cutie, what's your name?" she cooed, looking at the demon. She could see him sweatdropping and sense a wave of jealousy coming from Wick.  
  
"D-Dae..." he stammered, feeling quite uneasy. She put a hand to her chin and shrugged and proceeded to cast a curing spell especially for curse scars. But, the only drawback was, the wounded must rest for at least 8 hours...  
  
"There." She said, wiping off some sweat from her brow. She looked over her shoulder where the rest were still waiting for some people.  
  
"They're late..." Ronfar whined, picking up a pebble and tossing it on Kumamon's head for fun, earning a smack on the head from Raye who had picked up a thick stick earlier on.  
  
"Ow! What was that for!?" he said, rubbing his aching head.  
  
"Did I ever do anything to your digimon? No? Good! Then leave Kumamon alone!" Raye said as she retreated to her seat across Heather.  
  
"Are they always like that?" Heather whispered to Kimber. Smiling, the red- head nodded.  
  
"Always." She said and as if on cue, two digimon appeared, both scratched and one even bleeding from the arm.  
  
"Yo." Rouge greeted, waving at them. Kimber stood up and pounced on him.  
  
"What took you!?" Rouge winced. She shouted in front of his ear! He pried her off him and set her down on the ground.  
  
"You have no idea what we've been doing..." he said in an exhausted tone and sighed. He sat down and pulled some small orbs (think the size of poke' balls.) out of his pants' pockets and jacket pocket. Alara did the same. The others gaped. The crickets chirped. The... hey, I suddenly feel like a sucker...  
  
"Let's see... Ice, check. Wind, check. Thunder, check. Earth, check. Light, check. Dark, check. That's from us. How's your luck?" the elder Beelzemon said, looking at them. Rico pulled one he picked up earlier and tossed it over to Rouge. Rouge raised an eyebrow, looked at the orb and back at the kids and back again. They were expecting something when he suddenly shouted,  
  
"That's it!?!?!? Only the Fire Sphere!?" They all did a double-take and slowly nodded. Rouge turned chibi and sighed,  
  
"Great... we worked non-stop today going around practically circling the whole of the digi-world, hoping you'd get to at least Wendiene and... this happens..." chibi Rouge sighed again and Alara whacked him upside the head.  
  
"They did their best. Exactly how far do you think they could go for now? All I know, you yourself couldn't get to Wendiene's area."  
  
"Whoa! Hold the phone! Who's Wendiene?" Tosh said, stopping the two adult digimons. They both looked at him and Alara cleared her throat.  
  
"Wendiene is the Water Elemental. She is also known as the Water Angel for her grace and strength. But what I know very well is that boys shouldn't come." She said, hands on her hip. The boys, (except Rouge, who was looking quite embarrassed...) cocked their heads.  
  
"Why?" Lars asked, looking at his mom. She looked at him and folded her arms.  
  
"The main reason is because she can entice other digimon or even people. She may be an angel but let's not forget that she's also a 'siren'." Alara finished, sitting down next to Rouge.  
  
"Great... so, what're we supposed to do?" Rico asked, throwing the stick he was holding into the fire.  
  
"Hm... what say we go to the Black Cemetery? I remember we have to do something there." Rouge said, and suddenly noticed the missing member.  
  
"...Where's that girl who were with you guys?" he pointed at Bee, Black and Lucifer. They both looked at each other and looked at the former rouge digimon.  
  
"When we finished Flame Lord off, she got sucked in the portal and..."  
  
"She turned out to be a lucky girl and landed in the Sacred Sanctuary. The end. ...Am I right?" he said, giving a wry smile at them. They raised an eyebrow and Lucifer piped up.  
  
"How'd you know?" Rouge gave him a blank look.  
  
"What? I was right?" they all did an anime fall. And from how he was behaving, Alara had a bad feeling.  
  
"Oh well, we have to go now. Oh and by the way Heather, its best if you go with Rouge. Daemon is male, correct?" Heather nodded and Alara smiled.  
  
"Rouge, a word with you for a minute. And all of you, light's out. For all we know, someone's spying on us. Good night." She said and as she left the area, Rouge close behind her, the others exchanged strange glances. Strangely, Lars felt his heart break. For a minute, his vision blurred and only crimson filled his vision and as he regained his normal self again, he found it a bit difficult to breathe. What's with all these things...? A few minutes later, when everyone was sleeping, the young Beelzemon went to where his parents went. Just as he thought, they were near a cliff. His father was looking down from where he stood and his mother was right next to him, sitting with her legs dangling off the cliff. He was barely able to listen to anything they said but managed to anyway. And he thought he saw his father smiling.  
  
"Alara... it was just a dream. How can you tell if I'm going to disappear again? Didn't I tell you before I wouldn't let that happen?" Alara shook her head.  
  
"I know because I saw it! I mastered a technique called Future Sight and since it can only be used once, I saw everything! I know I'm not supposed to tell you this but please... once is enough... a second would make things worse..." she said, tears forming in her eyes. Rouge kept silent for a while and sat down.  
  
"...To tell you the truth, I know too. Listen, I can't promise you anything but I just want you to know that whatever happens, I just want to make sure you're safe. That's all." He said, pulling her closer to him.  
  
"But not to the extent of giving away your life!" she cried into his shoulder, gripping the leather jacket he wore.  
  
"...Tell me. What was the reason I gave you when I went to the Phoenix Palace and battled Zhuqiaomon for his help? And what kind of help did he give me?" she remembered that time. She was badly wounded by Imperialdramon to the extent of dying and the only mon who could help them was Zhuqiaomon. And because Imperialdramon's capabilities of damaging a digimon was great and that they were running out of time, plus the fact Rouge had told Zhuqiaomon he would give his life to save her, Zhuqiaomon extracted half of Rouge's life and put it in Alara's in order to revive her. Of course, because of that, Rouge became weaker and that was when Machinedramon caught him.  
  
"A type of help that would kill those who asked for his help." She said bitterly. Rouge smiled and sighed.  
  
"No. He helped me greatly. Believe me for all I know, I had nothing in mind than the thought of saving you." As he said that, she cried harder and he whispered something into her ear Lars couldn't hear.  
  
"I did it because I love you, Alara..."  
  
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In the Crimson Fortress, Neo Crimson was seen walking down the empty corridors of the Castle, pacing to his heart's content. No sound was present except for the sounds of his heels. He looked up at an embedded figure of a Crimson Noble stuck to the wall with a look of pain on its stone face. One hand was extended from the wall, as if trying to grasp something, only to be stopped short by its petrified state. The young Noble dropped his gaze to the floor and gritted his teeth, clenching his hands into fists until his nails dug into the palm of his hands. Without him noticing, blood had seeped out of the cuts his nails had made and slowly, one by one, drops of his blood dripped onto the floor to form a small puddle. He felt guilty. Very guilty. He didn't know how he had not been a survivor of the chaotic time. All the Nobles were changing into wild beasts, one by one losing their consciousness and sanity altogether. Across of where many stoned figures were embedded to the wall, a black shield was hung on the wall. There were two holes on the shield and one was right next to the shield in the shape of a sword.  
  
"Why...? Why must this happen to my clan...?" he said, suddenly noticing his wet hands. He looked at his right hand and then at his left. His left hand dropped to his side while his right was pressed to his forehead as he recalled the bloody event. Memories flashed before his very eyes as he ran his hand down to the side of his face, staining it red with his blood. He wondered how Zedomon appeared in the middle of the chaos-struck castle and how the silver deva knew of his ability to seal digimon. He knew almost nothing back then. Because Nobles were born Megas and in their gijinka forms, he was but as young as a 5 year-old human.  
  
//Flashback//  
  
A very young Neo was sitting in one corner of the palace, having born only a few days ago and looked at everyone. Some were attacking each other and some were even killed. Now knowing what was happening around him, the young Noble blinked his large red eyes and looked up at the looming figure of an adult Noble, his claws stained red from his prey's blood.  
  
"...Father...?" he said, hoping the elder Noble would tell him something of what was happening. Instead, the adult raised his claw, ready to swipe it at him and before he knew it, someone pulled him out of the way. He looked up and saw a silver-clad digimon.  
  
"Are you alright?" he nodded and before he knew it, he was standing in front of the main entrance, sealing away his own clan. Roars and screams filled the room, slowly pushing them away from the two. At the last minute, one of them, his father, extended his hand at him and he thought he heard the Noble call him. The sounds faded away and soon, the Nobles were no more, sealed away as petrified figures embedded to the wall of their own palace. After that, he couldn't remember anything.  
  
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"...Ever since then, you took care of me." Neo said, to no one in particular if someone saw him saying it. Suddenly, there was a silver light right behind him and Zedomon appeared out of it. The silver digimon behind him nodded.  
  
"I had no choice. Besides, it's just not me to just let a defenseless little digimon out on his own. Especially those who no nothing of their own abilities." Zedomon smiled, raising an eyebrow at Neo in a 'catch-my-drift' gesture. Neo sighed.  
  
"Besides, who would've known the one I raised turned out to be a real cute one." Neo blushed at the statement. Zedomon looked around at the fortress. Smiling and nodding, he turned to Neo with a playful look on his face.  
  
"Neo, give me a hug." He made a space between him and Neo and Neo gave a confused look, turning very red. Since he didn't make a move, Zedomon stepped up closer to the younger digimon.  
  
"W-why...?" Zedomon bent a bit so that he would be the same height as Neo and wrapped his arms around the younger digimon's slim waist and whispered in a playful tone,  
  
"Hm... You've been working out pretty hard. Nice..." he really liked teasing him! He finally let go of Neo Crimson and Zedomon had a triumphant look on his face. One hand was on his hip and the other held a red knife. Not just any knife, Neo's knife. Neo turned red with anger and embarrassment and made to grab the knife from Zedomon's grip when Zedomon grabbed his wrist and made him open his palm. Blood still flowed out of the wounds.  
  
"And this is one reason why I tell you not to keep claws..."  
  
"I DON'T have claws!" Neo protested. Zedomon raised an eyebrow.  
  
"Clip your nails then." Zedomon brought the younger digimon's palm close to his lips and muttered something under his breath. Silver threads suddenly appeared, circling around his palm, moving to Neo's and down to his wrists where they vanished. Neo pulled his hand away from Zedomon's grip and looked at his palm. The cuts were gone. But one thing which got him boiling was the fact that Zedomon still has his knife! His favorite knife, at that!  
  
"Give it back, Zedomon!" he extended a hand, demanding his knife back but Zedomon wasn't where he was a second ago. Then he felt something wiping his blood-stained cheek. And there was Zedomon, holding Neo's knife against the Noble's neck. Should he move, he's done for.  
  
"Wash your face. Blood doesn't suit you, nor does it my taste." He whispered in Neo's ear before giving the knife back and moving towards the wall. Neo wiped his cheek with his sleeve.  
  
"I can't believe you licked me..." Neo said, giving a grossed out face and glared at Zedomon who in return, winked at him.  
  
"You never know what I can do with just a little of your blood." Suddenly, Neo Crimson felt a strong wave of magic wash over him and it felt like his head was about to explode. He clutched his head, in a vain attempt of trying to stop it and before Zedomon could step any closer, Neo Crimson held a hand in front of him, a red orb forming in it. It took shape of a cannon and where it was pointed was directly at Zedomon's heart.  
  
"Neo, what's wrong?" Zedomon could only ask. If he moved, he might as well kiss the world goodbye. Neo Crimson looked up, crying and one hand still clutching his head, eyes glowing a menacing amber. Then, he cried in between sobs,  
  
"Make it stop... MAKE IT STOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" He fired his cannon randomly everywhere around the castle, almost destroying everything. Zedomon took this chance to get to Neo. Dodging all the lasers emitted from the cannon his companion held. Once he was close enough, he grabbed both Neo's arms and pinned him to the wall, writhing in pain.  
  
"Neo, listen to me, LISTEN TO ME, DAMN IT!!" he practically screamed at the Noble but, Neo still wouldn't stop. The young Noble was crying freely now as shrieking sounds caused by collision of strong magic waves ran past his head as if he were a medium of some sort. Finally, he couldn't take it. With a final agonized shriek, Neo Crimson fell unconscious. But before he fell to the ground, Zedomon caught him. He closed his eyes and placed his palm over Neo's forehead. Concentrating, he heard and felt what Neo did. Indeed, it hurt. Painful emotions rushed through him, screeches of magic 'friction' repeating itself in his head and when he had enough, he withdrew his hand, panting heavily and shaking his head with a look of horror.  
  
"No... this can't be... If Neo is 'that thing', I'm afraid there's nothing we can do to save this world..." Zedomon frowned and closed his eyes once more before teleporting away from the half-trashed castle.  
  
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The next morning, the girls went with Alara to Wendiene's area while the boys, including Heather followed Rouge to the Black Cemetery. At the boys' place, as expected, it was very dark. Wick used a light spell called Flash to light the area and there, they found out about something very important. Rouge's eyes widened when he saw a witch's staff with the hat hung on it and on a stone tablet, some words were engraved. They were dusty, showing that they were engraved there quite a long time ago. Rouge knelt down and brushed the dust away.  
  
"What is it Rouge? Found anything?" Rico walked up to the Beelzemon and he thought he heard the digimon mutter angrily,  
  
"...Tricked..."  
  
"What?" Rico asked. Rouge turned on his heel and crushed the stone tablet which he grasped in his claws.  
  
"We've been tricked!!"  
  
"What do you mean? I don't get you." Rico said, looking at the elder digimon.  
  
"Listen, a Witchmon worked for my father before. She was a close friend of ours, grouchy at times but okay otherwise... And besides, she's not wicked enough to use any of the spells you told me like that shadow spell 'Jaque Rue'. And it said in the tablet she was killed when we were headed to Machinedramon's castle before." Rouge said through gritted teeth. Everyone was shocked.  
  
"Hey, hey, how would you know? For all we know, maybe she killed another Witchmon or something." Ronfar said, hands behind his head. Rouge grabbed the hat that was hung on the staff and showed it to them.  
  
"This is proof enough for me." He said. The rest raised an eyebrow and Rouge sighed.  
  
"Do you see a black band around this hat?" he asked, putting the hat back where it belonged. Then, they remembered. The other Witchmon had a black band around her hat!  
  
"But, how can you be sure she's the Witchmon you know?" Lars asked.  
  
"...I demolished the rest of the Black Waltzes without a trace. She was the only one left. Or so I thought. So now we know, we'd better find Alara and the girls." They were about to walk away from the cemetery when spiked bones shot out of the ground, stopping them in their tracks. They weren't able to move very far when faded bits of data collected around the staff and hat and formed a ghostly figure of a witch. She walked/hovered in an unstable manner in their direction, dragging her staff along and stopped in front of them, looking through glazed gray eyes.  
  
"Hmmmm...? Who's there...?" she breathed in a ghastly tone. (think Moaning Myrtle from Harry Potter) Dae clamped a hand over Heather's mouth to keep her from screaming. (She's scared of ghosts.) The ghost swayed to and fro, looking at each of them with a blurred vision and occasionally swaying very close to one of them.  
  
"...You look... familiar... Have I seen you...?? Or... do I know you...? Hmmm...?" she half-cooed, hovering inches away from Rouge.  
  
"You knew me at least..." Rouge said, sighing.  
  
"Oh...? Do I...???? Ahahahahahaha... I must have... forgotten..." she slurred, hovering an inch away from his face.  
  
"Hmmm... Torque... no... you don't sound..." she breathed, this time hovering through Rouge to look at him from behind.  
  
"Now I remember... Rouge, isn't it...?" she circled around him, leaving a misty trail where she went through. (Think Eris from Sinbad)  
  
"You suddenly popped out. What gives?" now, he sounded more of the cold young mercenary he was before.  
  
"I sensed... Elrond..." she faded out slowly and vanished but she managed to say something before she vanished completely,  
  
"Separate the beast from its creator..."  
  
"...What does that mean...?" Tosh folded his arms and thought when Dae spoke up.  
  
"Separating the beast from the master... that ghost must've wanted us to prevent the master from being around the beast.  
  
"What does that mean? What the witch said was confusing and now you're giving me a headache!" Ronfar said, scratching the back of his head.  
  
"Oh, you mean like a puppeteer separated from his puppet?" Heather piped up.  
  
"Exactly. With no strings attached." Dae said, smiling.  
  
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Alara brought them all to a beach and that was when the girls were confused.  
  
"Why did you bring us here? I can't see a thing except the open sea." Raye commented, bending down to touch the cool water. Alara folded her arms.  
  
"You'll see in a minute." As if on cue, they heard singing. They all looked at a rock where water swirled around it and took the form of a beautiful mermaid.(Think the Watery card from Card Captor Sakura) The mermaid looked at them and smiled.  
  
"Good afternoon, everyone. I was expecting you. Care to come over? It's too hot out here." The Water Elemental turned her back on them and raised an arm. Suddenly, a HUGE wave was formed and it swallowed all of them up, into the deep sea.  
  
They thought they were goners but when they woke up, they were underwater, each of them surrounded by an air bubble and saw Alara conversing with Wendiene.  
  
"How's Firenze? I heard he was injured." Alara said, sitting in mid-air. Wendiene smiled sadly and said,  
  
"He's still unconscious. We couldn't wake him up. I just hope he's alright." Alara could see the Elemental's eyes fill with tears and decided to drop the subject.  
  
"Anyway, I'm sure you can't give the Sphere to us just like that without a fight?" Alara inquired. Wendiene wiped her eyes and nodded.  
  
"Okay. The three girls there will fight you." Alara turned to the three girls and motioned them to step forward.  
  
"We'll get the water sphere from you!" Raye said, smiling. Wendiene stood from her sitting position.(how can she stand up if she has a tail instead of legs!?)  
  
"Shall we begin?" she said quietly and a water barrier formed around her like a twister.  
  
"Sure! Kumamon, digivolve!" Raye's digivice glowed orange and Kumamon disappeared from sight, letting a SaberLeomon standing in the bear's place.  
  
"Wyna, I'll have to sit you out of this one. E-vie, you go ahead." Kimber said. E-vie smiled and pulled her guns out.  
  
"My pleasure."  
  
"Renamon, digivolve!" Jennifer's digivice glowed an icy blue and Renamon had digivolved into Taomon. (Hey, I played using Pack A in Digimon World 3 and my best digimon was my Taomon. :P)  
  
Wendiene waved her hand in front of her once and lance-shaped water flew in their direction. At first, they thought it was just an ordinary attack but not anymore when their digimon were hit. E-vie managed to escape with only a deep gash on her left shoulder, SaberLeomon was reverted back to Kumamon due to a separating side-effect the attack gave while Taomon's right arm was blown right off her shoulder. The fox fell to her knees and soon was sprawled on the floor, blood pooling under her from where the wound was. Wendiene wasn't smiling, nor was she frowning. She just looked on with a straight face and said,  
  
"Now you understand the true strength of the ocean?" she asked dimly, her ocean blue eyes glowing a menacing shade of blue. (If there is such colour...) Jennifer was speechless. She only managed to look at Taomon wounded, not being able to do anything when Incantemon stepped out from behind Kimber.  
  
"That may be so. But we won't surrender until we get the Water Sphere! Recover!" a blinding white flash engulfed them and when their eye-sight was restored, Kumamon was a SaberLeomon again and Taomon's arm was where it belonged. E-vie's wound had recovered too as they all stepped in front of Wendiene, ready for battle. (Think FF9's battle system. :P)  
  
"Very amusing. But, I'm betting that you won't even get past my pet Leviathan." She said, putting a hand on her chin. They all wore a confused look but was caught off guard when a great water dragon emerged from behind Wendiene, bringing a huge wave with it. (a wave under the ocean? Wow. O.O) It may seem to try and drown them but, the wave it brought took form of spears, piercing through them. E-vie was the first to re-appear after the attack, a water spear embedded on her thigh. She winced in pain as the salt water stung her wound.  
  
Wendiene raised an eyebrow. She wasn't expecting anyone to survive Leviathan's attack but was shocked to see her pet dragon dissolving into bubbles as it was cut down to a number of neat pieces and looked through the bubbles to see Incantemon holding her sword and smiling triumphantly.  
  
Before Wendiene was able to react, Taomon grabbed her huge brush from out of nowhere and a red letter appeared in mid-air as she wrote. Putting her brush away and her hands in a meditating position, she pointed at Wendiene and shouted,  
  
"BONHITSUSEN!" Purple, fiery fox demons erupted from the letter and lunged at Wendiene, only to be stopped by the Elemental's piercing shriek which caused the barrier around her to demolish the foxes. The others smiled. Wendiene trembled, realizing what a stupid mistake she just did. Thinking quickly, she regained her composure but failed to hide how she felt.  
  
"Wh-what's so funny?" she asked, backing away ever so slightly. E-vie grabbed her cannon and pointed it at the Elemental.  
  
"Let's see now. We weren't able to attack you because of your annoying defense ring. Now that it's gone, let's see if we can hurt you." E-vie shot a small black bullet at her and she only had enough time to evade it, only to let the dark energy bullet graze her cheek, cutting some of her hair at the same time.  
  
"Why are you running, Wendiene? Aren't you supposed to be fighting us?" E- vie mocked. Now something was wrong with her. Her blue eyes had turned a deep shade of purple and dark aura radiated off her. Kimber's eyes widened. She came across this situation before. But that time was because of Alara's Dark Mode controlling Rouge. Now, she had no idea what to do.  
  
E-vie continued to shoot at the defenseless Elemental and had dispatched of SaberLeomon, Wyna as well as Taomon as if they were in their Rookie forms. She was just about to shoot at Wendiene again when another bullet intercepted the one she had just released out of the barrel of her cannon. She turned to face Alara.  
  
"Stay out of this." She hissed. Alara stepped closer and pressed the barrel of her gun to E-vie's chin, pointing upwards. E-vie didn't budge however but instead pointed her gun at her mother with her free hand.  
  
"You don't scare me." She said, glaring at Alara.  
  
"I know I don't. Snap out of it, E-vie." Alara said sternly. E-vie backed away, guns still in hand and laughed.  
  
"Snap out of what? Afraid I might get stronger than you? Ha, ha, ha, ha!!!" black, angelic wings sprouted from her back and suddenly, the feathers fell to reveal bat-like wings. Alara frowned. She didn't waste much time or movement to evade an incoming shot. Turning to Wyna, who wasn't badly injured, she yelled,  
  
"Bring the others to shore! I'll handle her." Wyna nodded and instantly teleported all of them to shore, leaving Wendiene to protect herself since the ocean was her origin.  
  
"Now, it's just you and me..." E-vie smirked, spreading her wings for better mobility underwater. Alara did the same, pulling both guns out of their holsters and pointing them at the younger digimon.  
  
'I hope your side's alright, Rouge...' Alara thought to herself. Unfortunately, she was wrong.  
  
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Rouge back-flipped away from Lars and looked down at his shirt to find claw marks where Lars had used his 'Darkness Claw' attack earlier. He didn't know what was happening. A while ago, Lars had complained that his back had hurt and before he knew it, Lars had lost it. His usually green eyes now turned red, almost like when Torque had lost control over all the data he had downloaded. Lars growled and lunged straight at Rouge and pinned him down to the ground. Lars bared his fangs at Rouge and fortunately, Rouge was able to roll sideways, now Lars was pinned down. Lars roared in anger and strained against his father's grip.  
  
"What's gone into him?!" Tosh grabbed his digivice, Kotemon ready to digivolve anytime. Heather hid behind Dae, who was prepared for any attacks Lars might make. Rouge got off him and landed gracefully on the ground, guns in hand. Lars got off the ground, and crouched, one hand ready to grab his gun and shoot straight out.  
  
"What's wrong with him!? He just said his back hurts and this pops up!?" Ronfar exclaimed, scratching the back of his head. Cannondramon fired, his attack hitting Lars square on his back. Cannondramon smiled and his smile disappeared when energy data bits surrounded the crouching Beelzemon and slowly, the data bits were absorbed by him. Rouge frowned and turned to the rest.  
  
"Get back, NOW!!!!!!!" Everyone only had time to duck and just as they did so, Lars had fired a cannon blast, returning the one Cannondramon shot at him just a while ago. Cannondramon looked behind him, where the blast had made a hole right through some trees and whimpered,  
  
"What did I do to deserve this...?" But his question went unheard when he saw a pair of black, spiked boots in front of him. He whimpered again.  
  
"What did I ever do to you...?" he asked in a high-pitched voice. Lars growled and picked the digimon up by the neck. He was about to thrust a claw right through the digimon when someone grabbed him by the neck and slammed him down to the ground. It was Rouge. As he did so, Lars writhed in pain on the ground, all the way shouting something in an ancient digimon tongue and barely anyone understood him.  
  
Everyone stood, feet frozen to the ground as Lars continued shouting and before Rouge could do anything to stop him, the younger digimon dug his sharp claws into Rouge's arm, drawing blood from the elder Beelzemon. Rouge's grip loosened and he growled in pain. He withdrew his arm, causing the wound to run vertically down his arm to his wrist. His black jacket had turned a darker, more menacing shade as the younger one sneered at him in a crouching stance.  
  
"Rouge, you think we have a chance at beating him!?" Rico piped up. Rouge smiled and slowly shook his head no.  
  
"With normal abilities, I think not. Just stay out of this. I'll handle it." He untied the scarf around his left arm and tied it around the deep wound on his upper arm where his flesh could be seen and once he finished, Lars spoke, again in an ancient language. Rouge surprised everyone. He smiled and shook his head.  
  
"I don't have a death wish. At least not until I'm done with whoever's behind this." Lars got angry by his reply and with a mighty war cry, an intense battle began. Blows exchanged, claws digging into flesh and bullets grazing or wounding their targets. Blood was shed, angry battle cries and no one dared to step into this fierce and grueling battle.  
  
But it ended when Rouge was caught off guard by a bullet and as he successfully evaded it, something went through his chest. Lars had driven his claws through the elder digimon. After a little while, he withdrew his claw and Rouge staggered backwards, spitting out a mouthful of blood. Lars charged again, this time his claw found a new target which was Rouge's torso. Rouge's vision blurred and he slumped on Lars' shoulder, defeated. Slowly, he raised his right arm, which was wounded earlier and placed it on Lars' shoulder. Then he slung it over his son's shoulder and hugged him.  
  
"...Live on for me... you hear...?" he rasped into Lars' ear and closed his eyes, drawing his final breath. Lars, who had regained himself when Rouge said his last words, found tears running down his face. Slowly withdrawing his claw, he embraced the fallen Beelzemon before him one last time before he dissolved into data. He dropped to his knees and gripped the earth below him. The rest went up to him, knowing he was back to normal.  
  
Rico pitied his partner and clamped a hand over his shoulder.  
  
"It's alright... It wasn't your fault." Rico patted Lars' back gently and was only able to hide his feelings when Lars dug his claws into the earth and shouted out in pain, pain of losing someone very dear to him.  
  
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Before her very eyes, her mother broke down into data bits and entered her body, even if it was against her will to do so. Dumbfounded, she soon found herself at the beach, where everyone was waiting for her. Tears formed in the young female Beelzemon's eyes as she fell to her knees and cried. The others too, shared the same grief as they also knew what the outcome of the fierce battle was. Now that the Water Sphere was in their possession, they didn't know what to do next, as their only guide was gone but soon, they would find out that both their guides have been lost, in a miserable twist of event that they themselves don't have a clue of occurring.  
  
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Okay, I don't plan on writing too much but I felt like it. Hope you guys like it. The following chapters would be long too, I hope. BTW, just to tell everyone, yeah. My Beelzemon, Rouge and Beelzewomon, Alara, have reached their life limits today and because of this, this would be the ending to my string of sequels. Maybe in two or more chapters, this story would end and I would put down the curtains, never to tell the tale of the Rise and Fall, of a digimon's death.  
  
Please Review.  
  
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Impmon: You sure sound scary today.  
  
Shush Lars, I'm meditating!!!!! @_@ 


	9. Rise of the dark dragon, the fall of the...

Rise and Fall- chapter 9.  
  
Hah, I'm still writing! A big surprise for me. Okay, the last few chapters, which is estimated to be around chapter 10 or 11, will not have humor for those who are looking for some laughs. And, I think the rating should go up since I give full details on their battle scenes. And sorry, the quizzes are now closed because I am not allowed to surf the net for too long. :P By the way, I hope everyone enjoyed this fic and I really appreciate those people who stuck around to read this pointless fic of mine.  
  
I may be writing a whole new fic after this but I hope people would still enjoy it!  
  
Please Review!  
  
P/S:  
  
::talk:: -mentally speaking.  
  
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Everything was dark, cold and silent as death. Zedomon looked around the unusually dark area of the Black Kingdom. The Black King digimons may be dark-types but, they share the same light the Sacred Sanctuary does and now, the usually majestic building was reduced to nothing but debris. A small amount of data floated around the area where he stood, faintly gleaming in a vain attempt to light the area. A sudden cold rush of air made Zedomon lift his gaze to the path which would lead him to the Sacred Sanctuary. No digimon were in sight except for him and an unconscious Neo Crimson, whom he carried in his arms.  
  
His amber eyes reflected sadness but shed no tears as he knew it was not the time to do so when a group DarkTyrannomons and Cyclonemons sprang up from behind the deva. Without even turning to look at them, he let loose a high amount of energy which sliced through each one of his assailants. Pieces of thick flesh dropped to the ground with heavy thuds, staining the soil around them a dark crimson before bursting as black bits of data. Zedomon raised his head a bit, closing his eyes and took a deep breath.  
  
"...I wonder if Nina is alright... Ancient should have no problem taking care of Stigmamon." when he mentioned Nina's name, a red flash of light caught his eye. He looked down at Neo Crimson and the shard the younger digimon wore as an earring was gleaming brightly. Now, Zedomon was sure she was alive and well. He smiled to himself before setting off towards the Sanctuary.  
  
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However, what Zedomon expected out of Ancient to defeat Stigmamon was getting out of control. Lucifer was knocked down quite easily by the sword- wielding centaur-like digimon, Stigmamon. It resembled a knight among chess pieces; only difference is it stands on two legs, which were those of a horse, the head of a horse, arms of a man and a typical armor over his upper body and a pair of loose pants. To finish his appearance is a black, jagged sword. At first, Nina didn't think an arrogant digimon such as Stigmamon would be able to steal the Jewel around her neck very easily but seems like she was wrong. Tossing the jewel in the air a couple of times and smirking triumphantly over Lucifer's defeat, Stigmamon arrogantly said,  
  
"Well, where's your confidence now, girl!? Too scared to move? Or are you just about to join you useless digimon here?" Nina shook with anger, raising the Crimson sword at eye level.  
  
"I won't be defeated by the likes of you!" Nina rushed headlong towards the horse digimon and made to slash but seems like Stigmamon was faster and just as he was about to cut Nina's head clean of her shoulders, Chaos Lord only had enough time to grab the blade, cutting his own hand but the sword stopped, merely inches away from Nina's neck as Nina proceeded to slash Stigmamon's neck. Somehow, the sword didn't even make a cut on him!  
  
"Ha! You're too upset to do any damage on me! Now, go join your foolish friend in the afterlife!!" Stigmamon was just about to cut Nina in half vertically when a silver arrow caught the sword and out of Stigmamon's grip, sticking it on the wall for everyone to see. Stigmamon, being very surprised, looked around.  
  
"What!? Who did that!?" he yelled to no one in particular. A voice answered his question from behind.  
  
"Three guesses." Stigmamon whirled around, his hooves making loud 'clip- clopping' sounds against the cold stone floor and saw a wolf-like digimon. A wolf demon to be exact. The horse digimon staggered backwards in surprise; nearly turning Nina into a human pancake should she just stay where she was without Chaos Lord reacting fast enough to pull her out of the way. When both Nina and Chaos Lord followed Stigmamon's gaze upwards, they gaped in shock.  
  
"L-L-Luci-LUCIFER!?!?!?  
  
Standing before them was no longer the masked dark wizard Lucifer but he appeared in the form of a wolf demon, just as Ancient was. He had a typical rowdy teenager set of clothes, (see author's note below for mind-picturing) a sword which looked like it was made of blood itself and a red pearl earring on his right ear, piercing red eyes which had the fury of a wolf, wolf-like ears replaced his former ones which were those of a human's, typical fangs of a wolf and wolves claws replaced his former human ones. Two black angelic wings sprouted from his shoulder blades, making them look quite similar to those of Bee's, flowing grayish silver hair and to top everything else, an ash gray tail to finish his wolf-like appearance.  
  
"He... has a tail!?" Chaos Lord gasped in shock. Lucifer smirked, his face half hidden by the silver bow which he held firmly in his grip and growled menacingly. Stigmamon was breaking into cold sweats now but he was trying to keep his cool at the same time and muttered, loud enough for Lucifer to hear him while regaining his composure,  
  
"O-Okay, so you lived... But that doesn't mean I won't kill that 'sister' of yours!" upon hearing the remark Stigmamon had just let through his big mouth, rage washed over Lucifer as more arrows flew from his bow, two embedded themselves in Stigmamon's legs, which even went through the bone and all the way through to the wall and a few more accommodating themselves into Stigmamon's shoulders, hitting the nerves so as to immobilize him. The amazing thing was, the arrows destroyed the thick, heavy armor plates which Stigmamon had been wearing all this time.  
  
"Way to go, Lucifer!" Nina cheered, sheathing her sword. Lucifer loosened his grip on his bow and as suddenly as it appeared, it disappeared. His feet finally touched solid ground and what awaited him once he touched down was a neck-breaking hug from Nina.  
  
"Okay, so where's great times a thousand gramps?" Nina asked as she loosened her grip. Lucifer's cheerful face suddenly turned to a sad expression as he dropped his gaze to the floor.  
  
"...Ancient... gave up his very existence to revive me..." Lucifer said in a whisper. He could tell Nina was heartbroken but as his eyes glowed a bright crimson, he added in a barely audible whisper,  
  
"...But his heart and memories live on... here..." he put his hand over his chest, where his heart should be and it took Nina a few seconds to let the words sink in before she replied, feeling a bit better,  
  
"Well, one out of two isn't all that bad, I guess." Unfortunately, they forgot all about their little horse friend Stigma, who had yelled quite rudely,  
  
"Y-You RAT!!! I'll get you for this!! Just you wait!! I will!!" before he could continue his vain attempt of bursting their eardrums, Chaos Lord knocked the knight digimon unconscious and grabbed the stolen jewel from his pocket.  
  
"Now that that's over, let's head back to the Sacred Sanctuary. I'm sure the others would be twice as shocked as we were." Chaos Lord smirked, in a way that made him look like Bee.  
  
"One problem." Lucifer suddenly said, holding up one finger.  
  
"What?"  
  
"...I... kinda lost some abilities because of my 'makeover'..."  
  
"And that being?" Lucifer gulped before answering,  
  
"Namely... Darkness Shell." Nina winced. Great, now she had to be a 'bride' in order to go somewhere which required him to fly!  
  
"Okay, then I'll just have to get used to being cradled like a baby than just being in a bubble." Nina murmured, not sure whether she would do as she just said. Hey, it's easier to say than do!  
  
"Now that the discussion's out of the way, I suggest we get out of here before sleeping beauty wakes up." Chaos Lord pressed, turning to the other two. Both nodded as they made their way out, skywards.  
  
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Zedomon dove for the door, which was closing on him and drew his blade for Phantomons were waiting for him inside. Some were throwing their chains at him and the rest simply slashed at him.  
  
"Silent Death!!" the silver deva moved quickly around his assailants, moving behind each one without making a sound and once finished, he turned, sword down on his sides and only data remained behind him. Neo Crimson stirred and struggled to get on his feet, feeling the world around him spin. Without looking at him, Zedomon spoke,  
  
"MoonMachinedramon has been completed."  
  
"What?" Neo couldn't believe his ears. He knew about MoonMachinedramon but he didn't expect the full moon to be so soon. He looked up through the glass ceiling and just as Zedomon was about to tell him, the moon was in full circle. He was about to ask how this was done when Zedomon replied to his unasked question,  
  
"Our old 'neighbor' Cresent did this. The day of the full moon was supposed to be cloudy and should the clouds still be there, MoonMachinedramon wouldn't be at full power until the next full moon's day. But, Cresent had other ideas. And that was to MOVE those clouds. And as she expected, she succeeded in doing so." Zedomon now turned to face the younger digimon and as he did so, something pinned him to the wall and held him up by the neck. He grunted in pain and looked down. Neo Crimson looked up at him with enraged eyes and before he could say anything, the Noble tightened his grip around the Deva's neck.  
  
"So, this is the end of everything? Just because the Black Waltz herself is working for someone and is attempting to destroy the world!? And we're not even doing anything!!! How can you tell everything's over when we haven't TRIED anything!?!?!? True, everyone, including the 12 devas are already defeated but are you going to let them die in vain!?" Neo Crimson was close to tears now. His eyes were oddly glassy, his voice more desperate than usual as he slowly loosened his grip and dropped himself down to the floor, pounding his fists to the ground.  
  
"...It's not fair..." as he did so, there was a sudden thud of a chunk of wall and two familiar faces appeared. One had flaming red hair, with a flame saber and the other one was heavily wounded blue-haired person. The red-head sensed their presence and pointed his saber at both Neo and Zedomon.  
  
"Who's there!?" Zedomon's expression softened and stepped up to the other two.  
  
"Firenze! Bolt! You're safe." Firenze blinked and squinted.  
  
"Zedomon! What is happening? Dark digimons suddenly appeared at our doorstep and did all this! Are you responsible for this?" Firenze questioned, hissing at the silver-haired digimon. Zedomon held his hands up in defense, smiling and shaking his head in an innocent way.  
  
"No, you seem to have everything jumbled up. You see, Crescent is back. The Black Waltz herself is back. And it seems like she is helping a man named 'Elrond' re-create Machinedramon into MoonMachinedramon. I hope you haven't forgotten MoonMilleniummon. I bet you remembered how powerful he was. "Firenze gritted his teeth.  
  
"But that was a different story. MoonMilleniummon turned rebellious in the Ancient Forest. And both Bolt and I were able to defeat him. Unlike now, this situation isn't helping us any. The strongest spell-wielder of all is back, the great machine ruler powered by my moon, the ruby moon, reborn and a deranged human trying to steal the jewel of the all powerful clan, the Crimson nobles for God knows what reason!" Firenze tried not to shout. Bolt reached up to hold on to Firenze's shoulder for support and said through his ragged breathing,  
  
"Now's not the time to argue... I have Memoria sealed within where Crescent is headed to with my Storm Gate for her protection..." all three heads perked up and looked at him, surprised.  
  
"Bolt, have you gone mad!? Do you realize what you're doing to yourself!?" Bolt smiled weakly and nodded slowly.  
  
"I'll do anything to keep Memoria out of harm's way..." he nearly collapsed, his knees giving away but luckily, Firenze caught him just in time, wrapping an arm around the Thunder Master's waist to keep him from falling. Zedomon kneeled in front of Bolt, coming face-to-face with Bolt and held the gijinka thunder digimon's face up to meet his eyes.  
  
Zedomon looked straight into Bolt's eyes. Bolt tried moving his stern purple eyes away but somehow, Zedomon's demanding amber eyes bore into his, locking both their gazes. Then, Zedomon took one look into Bolt's eyes and slowly, his amber eyes slowly turned the exact color. In an instant, Zedomon could tell what Bolt was feeling and the next time he blinked, he smiled.  
  
"A noble thought, my friend." Zedomon smiled, patting Bolt's shoulder amiably. He shut his once purple eyes and re-opened them to return to their original amber ones. Bolt's pale blue tinged skin turned slightly pink, knowing what the silver digimon did.  
  
"The silver light of healing; Silver Breeze!" Zedomon let loose a small silver orb and it spun rapidly, slowly turning into silver threads twirling gracefully in the air and they all mended both Guardians' wounds, recovering their health. Bolt stood and glared at Zedomon.  
  
"I thought I warned you not to look through me!" Zedomon merely smiled playfully.  
  
"If we want to catch Crescent in her tracks, I guess we'll have to find her first. She still has business in the Sacred grounds. I'm sure of it." The other three nodded and headed to one place she would certainly head for; Zhuqiaomon's hall in the Sacred Sanctuary.  
  
At that very moment, in Zhuqiaomon's hall, sitting on the railing of the balcony, silk curtains flew about her as thunder crashed outside. She gazed with ominous eyes into the top of her staff, smiling as she mused herself with the small search party Zedomon had led who were searching for her. However, she had someone with her that would probably kill one of them at first sight.  
  
Flicking a lock of her silky reddish brown hair from her face, she turned around. Wendiene was on the floor, unable to move and injured very badly. Crescent kneeled down in front of Wendiene, whose body lay on top of a seal.  
  
"Congratulations. Your knight in shining armor is coming to save you. But, he'll join you shortly." She said calmly and stood up, a finger under her chin as she thought.  
  
"Too bad I decided to have some fun here. Otherwise, Memoria would be under my mercy by now..." then, her staff suddenly turned into a black silk cloth and wrapped around her as her shawl.  
  
"Hm... they're a bit late, aren't they?" she smiled and chuckled.  
  
"Let's 'call' them, shall we?" she smiled darkly at the fallen mermaid before her, whose eyes were puffy from tears and now widened with horror. Crescent summoned a black orb and it took form of black arrows a short while later. She shot them into the air and each one hit home. Her arrows found their ways to the vital part of Wendiene's body, not exactly hitting it. Wendiene screamed in pain and as Crescent expected, both Firenze and Bolt appeared at the door, one full of fire power and the other electricity.  
  
"Welcome. I expected you to come earlier. Tsk, tsk, tsk, typical of you gentlemen... Never seem to keep track of time, do you?" Crescent raised an eyebrow, looking at an enraged Firenze. Firenze tightened his grip around his precious saber and yelled,  
  
"LET WENDIENE GO YOU BASTARD!!!!!" Crescent merely gave a disapproving look, her smile vanishing as she stood up from her sitting position, straightening her robes out. Readjusting her shawl, she approached both Elementals. No sound was present except thunder crashing outside the window and the sound of Crescent's heels clicking on the cold floor. She was barely a meter away from the two when Bolt charged up and threw a thunder ball at her.  
  
A small explosion caused smoke to fill the room and as the smoke cleared, the lone image of Crescent stood. She was still where she was before Bolt attacked and she had one arm raised, covered with a dark energy. And in front of her, shielding her was a transparent black barrier similar to Lucifer's Darkness Shell. She lowered her arm, putting her shield down and took three steps forward, now merely one sword's swing away from both Elementals.  
  
"...Bolt, still as impulsive as before, I see." She said, pushing a lock of her hair behind one ear. She looked into Bolt's eyes, as she chanted a spell. Her eyes glowed green and in an instant, Bolt felt the bones in his body break. He screamed in agony as the pain became unbearable by the minute. Finally, the Thunder Master collapsed with a puddle of blood surrounding where he lay unconscious and most probably, dead. Crescent looked with satisfaction as she felt Firenze's will start to sway.  
  
"Why Firenze, I didn't know you knew what the word 'frightened' mean." Surely, Firenze's hands were shaking and somewhat cold. And all she did was look into another's eyes! Firenze grabbed his saber, trying to pull himself together and attempted to slice the dark witch in half but without even moving a muscle, she threw Firenze into a wall, earning an agonized scream from the flame lord.  
  
Crescent sighed as she stepped closer still, keeping Firenze embedded to the wall.  
  
"I was expecting more of you. I'm very disappointed." She said, smiling and crossed her arms. Just from the impact, Firenze's vision was blurring and plus the spell she was casting at him just from eye contact was hurting him even more. He was about to give in to Crescent's power but when he remembered someone important to him, he opened his eyes once more.  
  
Crescent cocked her head and smiled. She was getting even more interested now. Somehow, Firenze broke free from her spell and went over to Wendiene's side. He undid the simple binding spell Crescent had purposely put and held Wendiene close to him. She was barely alive and she was growing colder by the minute.  
  
"You... What have you done to her!!!?" Firenze yelled at the witch behind him. She merely shrugged.  
  
"You know I can do just about everything. You try and figure it out for yourself." Firenze growled and held the unconscious Wendiene closer to him, pointing his saber at her. She had a calm façade on and didn't even bother noticing the sword he was pointing at her. She walked through Firenze with a spell and with her back still turned to the couple, she snapped her fingers. A thick, red liquid splashed on the Flame Lord's face and in his arms where Wendiene previously lay was nothing. All he could see of the water Elemental was only her blood on his attire and her data circling the person he loathed most; Crescent.  
  
He screamed his heart out, feeling his heart shatter. Crescent had downloaded Wendiene's data and now looked at Firenze seriously.  
  
"Where is the Jewel-bearer?" she asked, no longer in her calm tone but now in a rather threatening tone. Firenze said nothing but lashed out at her with all the strength he could muster. To counter him, Crescent pulled her shawl off and turned it into her staff and raised it.  
  
Suddenly, a very powerful magic seal was under him. Her eyes glowed red this time, her pupils narrowing to those of a dragon and cupping Firenze's face, she said menacingly,  
  
"May the Black Dragon eat your soul." As she finished her sentence, a huge black dragon appeared out of the seal and lunged towards Firenze. He didn't have time to recover as what was left of him was only his blood, data and some limbs which the dragon didn't bother chewing on. Crescent looked on calmly, being used to it and to her, the sight was simply magnificent. Beautiful. Breath-taking.  
  
Behind her, she heard Bolt gasp in pain and turned on her heel, making a soft clicking sound. Smiling, she strode towards the Thunder Elemental. She picked him up from the floor, pretty much the same way Firenze did Wendiene and traced the side of his face. He winced slightly, still noting his broken limbs.  
  
"You'd make a fine warrior for me, Bolt. With strength like yours, I doubt anybody could go through your offensive defense." She continued running her finger up and down the side of Bolt's face, making him shift uncomfortably and suddenly, a small black spiral flew over and around him.  
  
"...You...!! Stop...!!" Bolt suppressed an urge to scream as she continued doing so, removing his holy energy and replacing them with dark energy. But something stopped her mid-way. She didn't like being interrupted and she didn't like it one bit.  
  
She sighed before speaking,  
  
"Bolt, you have no idea how much I'm fond of you. I admit, I liked you to the extent of loving you when I disguised myself as Memoria last time. I bet you haven't forgotten..." Bolt's eyes widened in surprise.  
  
"That's right. I gave Memoria that memory so that my plan would go smoothly. And when it did, I suppose I owe it all to you." Her face was mere inches away from his as she let her long hair fall onto him.  
  
"Unfortunately, you are still my enemy." Bolt was speechless by now. He looked at her with blank eyes, not knowing what to say or do. But one thing was certain; she was smiling sadly. She brushed her lips over his, at the same time draining his energy and downloading his data and once he vanished, she stood up.  
  
She stepped out of the room and looked back inside. She would never forget how he called her before he vanished. With expressionful eyes, she averted her eyes from the room and left, vanishing into thin air.  
  
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Meanwhile, everyone was at a loss. They didn't know what to do now both Rouge and Alara were gone. Nina went missing into another dimension, Witchmon turned on them, Lars and E-vie were controlled by something they themselves didn't know of, everything was simply too much for them.  
  
Bee however, was getting very angry at the situation. He somehow felt... useless. In the fierce battle he just witnessed, he couldn't even move a finger to help. And it was also because of what Lars had asked him to do which made him angrier. And that was to kill him.  
  
Bee clenched his hands into fists and strode over to where Lars was. He gritted his teeth, trying not to yell but did anyway, before anyone could say anything,  
  
"You damn IDIOT!!!" Bee practically kicked the young Beelzemon across the field, crashing hard into a tree. Lars fell onto the ground face-first and tried to get up, coughing up a mouthful of blood. Lucifer noted something to Bee mentally which made him yell,  
  
"This is between us Beelzemons, stay out of this!!" he growled, glaring at his friend. Then he strode ahead, where the fallen Lars was. Everyone gaped as they looked at him advancing. And Rico, being the master, tried to get to Lars before Bee would do anything worse to him.  
  
"Lars...!" he called. He was about to break into a dash towards his digimon when Black stepped in front of him, shaking his head.  
  
"Beelzemon has a point. This is one lesson Lars can only learn from another of his kind. It's only polite if we stay out of it. Besides, nothing would change Beelzemon's mind now." Black said reassuringly. Rico stared at the wiser BlackWarGreymon and looked on, worried.  
  
Bee kept on walking towards Lars, who managed to sit himself up against the tree, still wincing in pain. As he reached his target, Bee grabbed Lars' jacket collar and slammed him against the tree. Lars was at the edge of his consciousness from taking multiple hits but Bee didn't allow him to by healing his wounds. With just a simple flash from a ray of white light, Lars was cured but Bee, who had been mentally debating with himself, let go of Lars.  
  
Lars coughed slightly, trying to recover from the hit a while ago.  
  
"W-why...?" he didn't dare look up at Bee, whom he knew was furious.  
  
"Get up." Bee ordered simply. However, Lars was still on the ground, trying to hold back from throwing up any more blood. Unfortunately, he did when Bee kicked him in the gut. He grunted in pain when Bee picked him up again by the collar with one clawed hand against the same, half-broken tree Bee had hit him on earlier.  
  
"Why...?" Lars repeated his question through glazed eyes, Bee's glare penetrating through his very mind, as if reading what he was thinking. Bee tightened his grip and said harshly,  
  
"Because you've forgotten him already, haven't you!? You've already forgotten what his final wish was!!" Lars just looked into Bee's eyes, dumbstruck. That was when everyone noticed two guns' safety locks released. Bee didn't even have to turn around to see who it was. It was E-vie. It seemed she had gone through the very same thing as she was crying a river already, pointing her guns at Bee with shaky arms.  
  
"Put him... down!! Don't... make me... shoot!" Bee turned only to see her tear-stained face and said,  
  
"Wait 'till it's your turn." In his grip, Lars looked at her, shaking his head at her as if trying to get her to go away.  
  
"Mr. Forgetful here needs a psychiatrist for now."  
  
"I said PUT HIM DOWN!!!!" she screamed and opened fire. Lucifer attempted to use Shell of Darkness but somehow, a black flash caught him, engulfing him and he found himself flying through dimensions, where he will land, nobody knows. Black, noticing this, used one of his claw guards to block the bullets. Taking it off, he held her up against a tree by her throat in a loose grip as to not get her to suffocate. Kimber and the others froze.  
  
"I realize this is hard for you to do but stay out of this matter for now. Please." He said, in a way that it meant them to back away. Black didn't budge, keeping his grip right where is was and the extra pressure he put on her throat got her crying.  
  
Wick read through Lars' thoughts, which all the while have been looking at his younger sibling and like a medium, sent the message to her.  
  
'Don't cry, E-vie...' E-vie looked up at Wick who nodded at her.  
  
'You understand what he is saying, don't you?' he telepathically said softly. She replied,  
  
'Yes, I do... but isn't this enough!? Just going through all this makes me feel worse! When will all this end!?' she cried out to the wizard. Wick looked down onto the ends of his boots. Memories flashed before his eyes back to the time he was one of Myotismon's henchmen. He sighed to himself.  
  
'Eventually, E-vie. But what you need to do is face what's waiting for you; don't escape from it. It will stop once you stop running from it. Now, pick yourself up. Okay?' he said soothingly, using telepathic strength to wipe the tears from her face. As she had calmed down, his heart suddenly beat quickly, as if something had just awakened.  
  
It felt just like the time he first digivolved into Necromamon; his dark digivolution form. He closed his eyes and called upon it. Within his mind, he looked up into the blank dark eyes of his dark side. Looking up from the empty space he was staring at and looking into Wick's eyes, he opened his mouth to speak,  
  
::Is there something bothering you that you need me to counsel you?:: Necromamon asked politely, hazy jade eyes looking into a pair of emeralds. Wick avoided the dark wizard's eyes. Necromamon raised an eyebrow as a smile played upon his lips.  
  
::You can't hide from me forever, Wick. I am you. You am I. In other words, we are the same. You can trust me, can you not?:: Wick nodded slowly and turned to face the taller dark wizard who had kneeled in front of him, bowing.  
  
::It is about both the VanGuards and Crescent, right?:: Necromamon opened his once closed eyes and saw Wick nod in agreement. Necromamon pressed his forehead to Wick's, glowing a dark purple and backed away a short while later, feeling drained.  
  
::Necro.:: Wick called. The said wizard looked down and smiled.  
  
::No need to thank me. Crescent is one witch we must stop. But the VanGuards, you have to trust your sealing abilities or, trust them. Either way, you can help them. That is what you wish, isn't it?::  
  
Wick nodded again.  
  
::Yes, it is. Even if you said so, I want to thank you anyway.:: he said, turning to his other self and bowing in respect as the other did the same. Before he sealed his thoughts away, he heard the dark wizard whisper to him, words which would seemingly 'haunt' him.  
  
::I am you and you am I...::  
  
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Happy now? More words in! ^_^ At least this helps... 


	10. Open the gate!

Rise and Fall-chapter 10  
  
Yay! Chapter 10! ^_^ By the way Iniora, It's YOUKAI! Not Yoki. I wondered what it was and at first I thought it was a new type of maki or sushi... (now THIS is embarrassing...)  
  
Read and review!! No more questions asked!  
  
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Bee continued to bring the two siblings together. However, the word 'nice' didn't appear in his vocab so, he ended up doing it, the HARD way.  
  
"So that's it? You're just gonna forget 'em? You're not even gonna try and take revenge on whoever activated your Dark Modes?" Bee growled.  
  
"Personally, I'd say they are cowardly and forgetful fools. Pity their parents were capable of getting over their own problems and these two aren't." Black added. E-vie glared at Black.  
  
"We haven't...!!" Black cut her short, applying more pressure on his grip. Bee smirked mockingly at the statement.  
  
"You haven't, have you? Then why are you and your brother allowing us to hold you here as if you don't have a will to live?" Black growled.  
  
"If you're not ready for the battlefield, then you'd better 'cause if you don't, might as well kiss you friend's rears goodbye. We need every mon up at full throttle and having you two in a pity party when Black, Lucifer and I are going after Nina is..." Bee paused and turned a hundred and eighty degrees before throwing Lars across the field and continuing,  
  
"The LAST damn thing we need right now!!!" Now, Lars was mad. Really mad. He flipped in mid-air, landing in a crouch and digging his claws into the ground for extra brakes. This made Bee surprised and happy at the same time. Lars grabbed both his guns and threw them harshly on the ground before standing back up in a half-crouching fighting stance.  
  
"Calling me a coward is the last thing I'd hear coming out of you. Not when father made me promise to keep on living. And especially for him." His claws glowed menacingly, showing that he was ready to swipe his claws at any time at all. Bee smirked and threw his own guns away, fighting fair so to say.  
  
"Y'know, you two remind me a lot of your pops; stubborn idiots till the very end." E-vie heard that statement and she didn't like it one bit. Rage engulfed her as she growled and kicked Black away from her. She flipped in mid-air, taking her guns out and pointed both to Bee, who was occupied enough by her brother.  
  
"Take that back about my father!!" before she could pull the trigger, Black punched her in the face. She didn't receive a full impact as she did a last- minute evade but got hit anyway. This resulted in her grip loosening and with that chance; Black kicked her guns out of the way as they both landed neatly right next to Bee's.  
  
"I'm sure he would kindly do so if it were not the truth." Black smirked. E- vie returned it, wiping a thin trail of blood from the corner of her mouth and said,  
  
"Glad you knew."  
  
It didn't take the two long to have both elder digimon backed up against each other, arms suffering from cuts and scrapes. Realizing how bad their condition was, Black and Bee looked over each other's shoulders to look at one another and exchanged mental comments.  
  
::Well Beelzemon, I guess you can pat yourself on the back for doing such a good job getting them back on course now.:: Black noted mentally with a smirk. Bee noticed the sarcasm and rolled his eyes.  
  
::Gimme a break... Now I'm starting to regret calling Rouge an idiot in their faces the first place.:: Bee said with a smirk.  
  
::You simply said the truth. It's not your fault they dislike it so much.:: Black replied, getting ready for another attack made by either one of the two.  
  
::Eh,:: Bee couldn't say anything more.  
  
"What're you two thinking about?" Lars growled. Bee closed his eyes, smirking and said in a mocking tone,  
  
"Nah, just how we're gonna explain to Rouge when we eventually head on up that it was us who had to send you and that pathetic fighter of a sister to your graves when we were just trying to get you back in check."  
  
"That's it!!!" E-vie dashed in Black's direction and was about to kick, as did Lars but both managed to stop just centimeters away from both their targets faces. Both Bee and Black had a mixture of pain and surprise on their faces as they both fell on their knees and doubled over in pain. Before they both hit the ground, both Lars and E-vie caught them.  
  
"What's wrong?" Rico hurried over to the small group, his twin and both wizards following them.  
  
"Good question...!" Bee grunted in pain. He was cut off in mid sentence when pain shot through him. He managed to suppress a scream as they realized what was happening.  
  
"Nina...!!" both Black and Bee said in unison.  
  
"Huh?" Tosh didn't quite get the situation as Ronfar was currently clueless. Black opened one pained eye to look at everyone.  
  
"Nina... is in pain...! And... what we're feeling now... is just the blunt... end of it!" he held on tighter to his abdomen, where the pain was greatest when power replaced them. Both Wick and Wyna pulled their respective master/mistress and partners back before anything happens to them.  
  
"What's happening to them!?" Heather said, as she peeked from behind Dae. Dae narrowed his eyes, a cold sweat running down his back.  
  
"They can't be... They're Spirit Digivolving!" Dae said as he shielded Heather.  
  
Bee and Black were now engulfed in a white light, their bodies breaking as if their datas were downloaded but both merged into one. They saw the silhouette of the Chaos Lord, a familiar form who was yet unfamiliar. His former black armor was now white, streaks of silver and grey etched onto it. The huge shield he once used to defeat the Fire Elemental vanished and his sword had now seemed to be even redder, crimson lines dashed across the blade to form an intricate pattern. His former short red hair kept its color but now it grew to rest between his shoulder blades.  
  
Chaos Lord opened his amber eyes in shock and his hand instinctively reached his racing heart where he attempted to calm it. Heather watched in awe as Dae took a step back in surprise.  
  
"It can't be... C-Chaos Lord...!?" Dae almost squeaked but Chaos Lord heard this and looked at the demon. The amber eyes seemed to pierce him as Chaos Lord smirked. Dae only managed to blink.  
  
"I guess you've never seen my two parts as a whole." Chaos Lord said with a chuckle. He stood up to his full height, letting his powers settle down.  
  
"We can wait no longer. We must depart to the Sacred Sanctuary now." Everyone nodded but paused when they noticed that Chaos Lord had zoned out for a minute.  
  
"What's he doing?" Heather asked. Dae didn't reply. She pouted and stepped up to Chaos Lord. Standing on her tiptoes, as tall as she could stand, she waved a frail hand in front of the Spirit digimon's face. Chaos Lord blinked a couple of times before smiling and gently pulling Heather's hand away from his face, which made Dae think of the unimaginable.  
  
"I was having a conversation, dear lady. You needn't worry." Heather gulped as she went back to Dae's protection.  
  
"I've just received word that we can no longer use the direct route to the Sacred Sanctuary and that we are needed now, I suggest we use a shortcut through Ancient's Woods." Chaos Lord said, cocking his head to the said forests' direction. Dae nearly jumped in surprise.  
  
"A-A-A-A-A-ANCIENT'S WOODS!!!?!??! That's insane!!!" he shouted without realizing he just did and felt a bit embarrassed when he finally realized what he just said. Chaos Lord chuckled.  
  
"Normally yes; with Nina and Lucifer saying that they'll be there to help open the gates to the Land of the Forgotten Kings, it's only half as insane as it sounds." Chaos Lord almost laughed.  
  
"Well, all in favor of insanity, say I." Rico joked, looking around at the rest with his hands on his hips. The others smiled and said,  
  
"I!" Dae and Heather exchanged looks before agreeing.  
  
"I... I guess we could tag along too, if you don't think we'll bother you..." Heather said quietly. Tosh grinned.  
  
"Are you kidding? The more the merrier, y'know?" he laughed, slinging an arm over Heather's shoulder in a teasing manner. Heather blushed and held back her reflexive move of punching the red-headed boy in the nose. Renamon looked at Chaos Lord.  
  
"By any chance, does this forest you call 'Ancient's Woods' have any means of demons or other possessed hell monsters in it?" obviously, the question was in favor of the scaredy-cat Jennifer. Chaos Lord looked over at the sensitive blonde girl mention and said with a mischievous smirk,  
  
"Only the friendly kind." Instead of making Jennifer feel better, it made her doubt she'd go through the forest conscious.  
  
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Crescent looked disapprovingly into her staff's 'mirror'.  
  
"What is she doing!? I didn't create a fake of myself to cause such a disturbance! And by using the Spell of Past, it would take me some more time before I regain full power!" Crescent growled. True, it was a fake. She wouldn't waste her powers just to halt them in a backfiring manner! Besides, the Spell of Past seemed to be in favor of her enemy's team! She crushed the small mirror, crushing her fake and felt half of her lost magic recovered.  
  
She continued to go through the corridor and met up with two mons whom she wouldn't want to bump into; Neo Crimson and Zedomon. Drat! She was concentrating too much on what to do that she didn't even SENSE the two mons! She growled as both pulled their swords out.  
  
"Crescent! Finally we meet." Zedomon swung his sword in her direction, expecting her ever present protection shell in place. She put her hand in the air as if holding the hilt of a sword as her protection shell dissolved and formed a black sword. Without much effort, she pushed Zedomon back. Both skidded and stood their grounds. Crescent pulled her hat off as it turned into a black ribbon and tied her hair up into a high ponytail. Her attire changed, thanks to a wave of magic. Her dress changed into a tight- fitting battle costume, (Think Madonna's black counterpart in her video clip of 'Die another day'.) and her high-heeled boots were thigh-high as she pointed her sword in Zedomon's direction.  
  
"I have no time to be playing around with the 13th Deva who shouldn't have been a Deva." She said, her lavender eyes turning Zedomon's shade of amber. The sword she held rippled with demonic magic as both attacked at the same time,  
  
"Blade of Chaos!!" both attacks intercepted mid-way but with the help of a magic-amplifying spell Crescent cast on herself, she pushed Zedomon into the ground. Zedomon's sword flew right next to Neo's leg and he seemed to have no mobility at all. His movement was stopped. Without looking up, Cresent raised a palm in Neo's direction.  
  
"REAF MIUZ!!!" a bolt of black magic shot out from her palm and struck Neo square on the chest and with an agonized scream, the Crimson Noble vanished. Crescent paused, realizing that she had only casted a teleportation spell and growled as Zedomon kicked her off him. He flipped backwards and when he was about to land, he opened both wings. Strangely, they weren't angelic. It seemed more like white demon wings. He drew his sword from the ground and stayed airborne, pointing his weapon in Crescent's direction.  
  
Crescent merely looked up and turned. She pulled her ribbon off, making it return to its original form of her hat and her clothes were also in their original forms. She looked at Zedomon again.  
  
"I would like to play around with you some more Zedomon but unfortunately, I don't have the time to be playing around. If you wish to interfere with my work, I'd advise you to help that little jewel-bearer before I myself get to her."  
  
"And where would that put you?" Zedomon almost growled.  
  
"That's none of your business. Reaf Miuz!" she herself vanished as Zedomon narrowed his eyes and landed. Folding his wings back in place, he felt the whole world spin around him. He held on to the wall for support and with his head down, he coughed out blood. He could feel his knees shaking as he continued to cough and as he stopped a short while later, he was gasping for air as he slid down the wall.  
  
He looked up at the ceiling and frowned.  
  
"Bolt... Firenze... Wendiene..." he bowed his head at the mention of these names. He knew what had happened to them and it wasn't a pretty picture. He bit his lower lip and slowly stood up. One hand immediately found their way to his broken ribs, thanks to the impact of his fall and he slowly walked to where the Storm Gate was.  
  
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Neo Crimson sat up, rubbing the back of his head from his mislanding. He looked up, sensing danger and took his dagger out, not needing any effort in springing to his feet and driving the knife into the dark digimon's chest, right where the heart should be.  
  
"Okay... Dark shadows, blank trees, damp soil... The Cursed Shrine??" Neo raised an eyebrow. He wasn't expecting to be in a place where he would gain more power. He was expecting more of a dark spell. He pushed the dark Mega digimon off his knife and slid down the side of the hill. As he slid halfway down, he spread his black, bat-like wings and dove down, sword in hand.  
  
"Sheesh... the enemy keeps on coming! And darn... someone with the jewels is here...!" Neo paused for a split second to touch the shard he wore on his left ear. Then, he heard voices. Jumping over some enemies and cutting them down at the same time, he was just in time to throw it to one. As quickly as he had thrown the knife, he withdrew it and turned it into his sword, pointing it in his enemy's face.  
  
"Hey buddy, watch where you're... aiming...?"  
  
'...A girl? A HUMAN girl???' Neo questioned himself. He looked at her right in the eyes and she had a strange expression he had never seen anyone pull. She looked at him almost from head to toe and it made him shift a bit uncomfortably.  
  
"A human?" he questioned, trying to confirm his thoughts and at the same time, a bit agitated by her staring at him. One of the many things Crimson Nobles never liked; being stared at.  
  
"Well duh. Who were you expecting, the real Athena?" she said with a strange smile. Neo blinked. A mon he didn't notice who was standing behind her emitted a low groan. And somehow, he heard someone speaking.  
  
::Chaos Lord, I'll warn you now. Nina's found dating material.:: with her glaring at something behind him, he shook his head slightly. Was he hearing things?  
  
"A bit ironic that the Keeper of the Crimson Items would find herself face to face with one of the Crimson Nobles, no?" Neo looked to the side and saw Chaos Lord. Quickly sheathing his sword and turning towards the taller mon, he said,  
  
"Chaos Lord! I was separated from Zedomon and the others! Crescent is making her way to the main throne room and..."his worry-stricken voice dropped to one of despair as he finished,  
  
"MoonMachinedramon is completed..." He looked down to the end of his shoes and Chaos Lord took some time to let all the information sink in and after it did, he sheathed his sword and asked, suddenly remembering he hadn't been in good terms with this certain Noble and had not even bothered to ask for his name,  
  
"Whom, may I ask, are you?" Neo Crimson looked up, straight into Chaos Lord's blue orbs and said,  
  
"My name is Neo Crimson," the human girl he saw beforehand sighed and he blinked a couple of times as Lucifer had hit the back of her head with one of his 'paws'. His red eyes widened as he recalled who this mon was. A werewolf appearance with ash-grey fur, and a crimson blade. Surely, this digimon is none other than,  
  
"L-Lord Ancient!" Lucifer turned to the red-head digimon and shook his head.  
  
"No, my name is Lucifer. It's kind of a long story how I look like Ancient but it's going to have to wait till another time. Like you said, we still need to hurry up and catch up with the others." Lucifer said, earning a nod from the Noble. He turned on his heel towards the advancing enemies and unsheathed his sword. It glowed red after a short while and he started everything off with a war cry and rushing headlong towards the enemy.  
  
He jumped in the air, sword high above his head with a menacing gleam and as he brought the blade down, he bellowed,  
  
"CRIMSON SLASHER!!!!"  
  
The blade struck dark flesh, once.  
  
Shrieks of wounded or nearly dead enemies filled his ears, seeming as though the sound would forever haunt him.  
  
Twice,  
  
He had taken down more of the enemy. More screams and cries of pain printed themselves in his mind, forcing it almost to its limits. One hand clutched his head as he continued slashing down the dark forces.  
  
'Ugh...!! What's... wrong... with MMMEEE!? ARGHHHHHH!!!!!!!"  
  
Thrice, the fourth, fifth, sixth slash until all that's left of the dark army were mere pieces of flesh surrounding the young Noble. Panting slightly and sweat dotting his forehead with some running down the side of his face, he turned to his new-found 'companions' and as he took one step towards them, he felt another strong surge of magic screech.  
  
"AAARRGGGHH!!!!!!!!!!" Neo fell onto the ground, clutching his head. It hurt worse than before. If there was any sound worse than the sound of scraping glass, that would be what he was hearing and what he was feeling... it was excruciating! His head throbbed and it felt like it was going to burst, his body felt weak all of a sudden and what pained him most was the images that ran in front of his eyes.  
  
Wendiene was dead, Firenze and Bolt experienced the same fate. As if predicting the future, all, each and every one of them, fell to the ground, defeated. There was no other color for him to see than the crimson taint of blood. He writhed in pain on the ground as he felt a pair of gentle arms cradle him, as if protecting him.  
  
The sound had faded slightly, the throbbing had grown weaker and he could open his eyes slowly. He looked up weakly, and met the human girl's eyes. All he could remember before falling unconscious was saying a name he never knew had been in his memory,  
  
"...Ni...na..."  
  
Meanwhile, Crescent was being stopped in front of the main throne room. She reached for the handle but, a force field seemed to be stopping her from doing so. She growled.  
  
"I'm just wasting my time... I know the Storm Gate is here and in here is where I can control our little 'conductor'." She glared at the door and narrowed her eyes. Shifting her gaze to the weak point of the barrier, she found it resting on top of the door handle, just in between the two huge doors. A smile played on her lips and with a simple wave of magic, the barrier was broken and she stepped inside.  
  
The room was much bigger than she had expected. Surely, it would have passed for a ball room than a throne room. An orb twice her size was glowing in front of her with a fairy-like creature in it, sitting without any movements, as if she were chained. The fairy's head was bent down so she couldn't see her face and Crescent cocked her head to one side before approaching it.  
  
::...Is it my time already...?:: a quiet voice rang in Crescent's mind, repeating itself as if it was a chime of some sort. Crescent's smile disappeared as she stopped right in front of the fairy.  
  
"If that is how you see it, it is." The fairy still didn't flinch, still curled up in a sitting position with her head resting on her forearms.  
  
::Then... is it true that our world is coming to an end? That the battle which will erupt would end our very existence?:: Crescent clenched her fist. She knew the fairy was going to say that. She knew it would happen so, why? She didn't know either and she found it hard for herself to answer.  
  
"...Everyone's time will come, Memoria. Now, I want you to..."  
  
::Release my gate and cause everyone's death? Never.:: Crescent could feel her blood boiling and pulled her staff in front of the fairy.  
  
"Now listen, Memoria. You may be the Great keeper of Time and Space but that doesn't mean I cannot defeat you!!" Memoria looked up at the witch with her eyes closed and slowly opened them. Her eye color changed with every blink she did and just continued to stare at the witch, as if she never met her before.  
  
::...Everyone's not perfect. I may be powerful, but that doesn't stop anyone from killing me.:: Memoria said in an almost lifeless voice. Crescent glared at the time keeper and dropped her hands to her sides, bowing her head so the fairy couldn't see her face.  
  
"Memoria, you may be right, but you may be wrong. Whether you're right or not, this is the path I have chosen! And I will not escape from it until I finish it. Yes, I know I have chosen what is wrong in your eyes but what matters to me is that I've come this far! I'm not going back. No, not now! OrmeAni Don!!!" Black thunder crashed around the witch and surrounded Memoria, forming four black orbs which shot powerful magic at the petite fairy below.  
  
Memoria held her arms up to her face, trying to protect herself. She emitted cries of pain whenever she was struck and just as she thought she couldn't make it, she called out,  
  
"Gate of Time! Gate of Memories!! Lead me to my throne, let us bring this witch to judgement!!" a portal opened above Memoria, canceling Crescent's spell. Crescent was taken aback by this and cancelled the spell herself before being sucked into the dimensional vortex.  
  
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By this time, Rico's party has reached Ancient's Woods. Sure enough, the place was crawling with hell creatures. Most of them were either Virus digimon or mutated digimon. Chaos Lord led the way, making almost a straight line through the forest with his beam attack. The rest followed, all in either their Mega or Ultimate forms, some even in their Hybrid forms.  
  
"If there was one thing I'd LOVE to have now, I'd love to get outta here!!" Ronfar exclaimed, ducking from an axe which hovered just above his head. Tosh, who had merged with his Kotemon, gave a sarcastic laugh.  
  
"That's just because you can't figure out how to biomerge!" Heather sweatdropped.  
  
"It's a miracle they came this far and survived, you know Dae?" her Daemon just nodded. Blizzmon, also known as Blizzard, froze the whole area, freezing their incoming enemies. Satisfied that the enemy was no longer mobile, she turned to Chaos Lord.  
  
"So, where do we go now?" Chaos Lord, as if in a trance turned to her, in an almost shocked manner. He looked around, where the temperature was dropping to a considerably freezing point and sighed.  
  
"We have to find the Gate first. Even though the Gate is right in front of us, it needs two forces to open it. One exactly from the origin and one from here. Unfortunately, Nina is nowhere near the Gate."  
  
"Then, why don't you tell her to go to this 'Gate' thing?" Rico folded his arms, rubbing both his arms as the cold area was making him quite sleepy and cold. Lars took his jacket off and handed it to Rico, who had graciously put it on and the Virus Mega scratched the back of his head, approaching the Gate he's been hearing out of Chaos Lord's mouth.  
  
"So, what's the big deal? You're just like one of the digimon in the Sanctuary, right? Can't you open it?" He put one hand on his hip, looking straight at Chaos Lord's eyes and the only response he got was; a blink. He looked at Chaos Lord in a sort of uneasy manner and asked,  
  
"What!?" Chaos Lord sighed, shaking his head and patted the younger mon's head.  
  
"Kid, you need some senses knocked to your system. The only digimon who can open this thing are those who either come from the Sanctuary or are actually there. So, there's no other way we can open it that ask Nina to help us with it." Lars huffed, folding his arms across his chest and pondered for a bit. Smirking, he cracked his knuckles and turned to the Gate.  
  
Chaos Lord narrowed his eyes at what the Beelzemon was doing but allowed him to anyway.  
  
"Get a hold onto something 'cos things are gonna get rough." He started to collect energy, his whole body glowing with a dark glow and things suddenly clicked. Wick looked up at where Lars was from his sitting position and shouted,  
  
"No, DON'T!!!" Too late. Lars' wings had grown larger, the feathers replaced by a typical pair of demon's wings. A strong wave forced Chaos Lord a few steps backwards as Lars continued his transformation.  
  
There wasn't much change in his attire besides the fact that the spikes on his boots vanished and his mask melted, bringing his third eye with it. He looked more human now, if not for his face, which still had the blue tinge to it and his tail.  
  
Daemon shielded Heather with his wings as energy continued to erupt from Lars' body in waves.  
  
"What's happening!?" Dae strained his ears(or whatever he has in the absence of ears) to listen to his tamer and once he had the question figured out, he replied,  
  
"I don't know! No digimon ever digivolved this way!!"  
  
~~~~~  
  
~~~~~~So, what will happen to Lars? Stay tuned for more in the next chapter!!!~~~~  
  
****Preview****  
  
Nina pouted cutely, her cat-like ears drooping slightly and folding her arms across her chest and said,  
  
"Great... And I thought I got surprises for you guys... Spoiler!!" She made a face at Lars, who in turn frowned at her in an annoyed manner. Neo, who felt like he was left out, suddenly piped up,  
  
"Wait a minute, wait a minute... Since you were able to open the Gate... Do you happen to be one of the two VanGuards?" Lars, in his so-called 'VanGuard' form, turned to Chaos Lord. Chaos Lord shrugged, leaving Lars to turn back to the Noble.  
  
"What the heck's a VanGuard?" Wick looked upwards into the sky and his jaw dropped. There was a huge hole in the sky. It had a diameter big enough to swallow up half of the File Island.  
  
"Oh... My..." Wick couldn't finish his sentence. Before he knew it, everything turned black. He knew he wasn't unconscious, he wasn't passing out. The 'Summoning of Demons' has begun.  
  
****End of preview****  
  
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Dude, check it out!! Wish I could stick longer but not to worry! I will be writing to the end!!! (And starting another one, I hope.)  
  
So, whaddya think? Everything except Crescent's battle against Memoria will be told, (due to the authoress' lack of creativity to explain the situation...) But, there's a catch. And it's about the number of reviews. Look at the list below and I'll see what I can do.  
  
P/S: I'll probably start writing the new fic two weeks after the last chapter of Rise and Fall is put up!  
  
Request List!!  
  
40 reviews ---- A fairly short and humorous fic, not much action. (1 Tamer, 1 Digimon.)  
  
45 reviews ---- A long story, either angsty or action-packed. (A group of Tamers and Digimon.)  
  
50 or more ---- A detailed story, R for blood and language. (Either about a digimon or a tamer and his/her digimon or a group of tamers and digimon.)  
  
That's all for now folks!!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	11. The Demon Summoning The Icy wind

Rise and Fall – chapter 11.  
  
Whoo! 11! Lucky number!!  
  
Iniora: Hopefully this is alright...  
  
Blackmage: Hey, I really think you'd be depressed reading the final chapter so, prepare yourself!!!  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
A/N:  
  
[]-thoughts.  
  
'...'- mental link.  
  
The pulsing energy kept on leaking, as if it would never cease and just then, Lars drew a fist back and punched the Gate. There was silence as the energy wave slowly dissipated. Lars was panting slightly, his fist still in contact with the Gate. Silence hung in the air for a few more minutes before the Gate burst open, light flooding the forest. And that was when Lars smiled.  
  
"Yeah! So my theory was right after all!" Lars pumped a fist in the air, laughing and E-vie, who knew exactly what he was thinking, giggled to herself.  
  
"What the heck did he think about anyway?" Wyna queried the female biker. She smiled at the witch and said,  
  
"Well, while we were still in the graveyard, Bee said something about our dark Modes so, he thought that they were from the Sanctuary before. If he could just trigger that dark Mode of his, he could open the Gate. And, he was right."  
  
Everyone picked themselves off of the ground and started into the Gate, waiting if the Sanctuary was still in one piece. However, dark energy was still pulsing all around them.  
  
Neo Crimson opened his eyes slowly.  
  
[Has it gone?] he calmed himself, and after making sure the magic surge wasn't there anymore, he reached to his side where his knife was and at the slight sound, he sat up, grabbed the first victim he could and held his dagger towards the creature's neck. His eyes widened. It was wolf-like, but human at the same time. Those eyes, hair and face were of the human girl he met earlier.  
  
"...Who are you?" he was trying to confirm for himself and the demi-human in front of him sighed,  
  
"Nina, this is the second time we met, how are you? How long has it been? Oh, just about 5 minutes. I can't believe you've forgotten!!!" she opened a palm, almost as if she was going to summon a weapon of some sort and... slapped the poor Crimson. He rolled backwards twice from the impact, landing in a sitting position with one hand over his still throbbing cheek where the slap had stung.  
  
"Ow...! Why you...!! I'm gonna-"he was just about to slash her in half when Lucifer came into view.  
  
"Hey guys, we're going to the Gate. You coming?" Neo reluctantly put his sword down and growled. He stood up and went after Chaos Lord, who was well ahead of them.  
  
"...Hey Nina, did you..."  
  
'Do 'it' to him?' Nina turned bright red and started whacking poor Lucifer's head numerous times, causing the little wolf to have bumps all over his head.  
  
"Why you... PERVERT!" Then she stomped off. Lucifer rolled about on the ground, clutching his head.  
  
"Oh...! By the name of the Digi-world!!! I've never felt this much pain!!! Oh!!! The Pain!!!"  
  
Later, they were on their way to the Gate. Neo closed his eyes and in a flash, he saw both Crescent and Memoria. Shaking his head, he growled to himself.  
  
[What's wrong with me!? God! I can't take this! Where is Zedomon anyway...!? Hopefully he's alright...] Then he stopped. He was getting irritated by the way Nina was keeping an extremely close eye on him and she bumped into him. He let out an exasperated sigh, somehow managing to make Lucifer and Chaos Lord disappear from view and he said,  
  
"You don't have to concern yourself over my own personal health." He turned to her, where she took a step back and pouted.  
  
[Oh, no you don't. You ain't gonna try and give me that little 'puppy-dog eyed treatment! And I'm sure as hell I want an explanation out of you!] he noted to himself he wouldn't fall for it and it worked.  
  
"But it's boring just wandering aimlessly through the forest..." he frowned. He was mad, very mad. He didn't like the thought of people worried about him and he didn't like it one bit. He didn't need anyone to worry about him. He didn't need anyone to help him. Above all that, he didn't like the idea of having people into his personal emotions or conditions.  
  
Feeling his anger go well over him, he grabbed the half-demon by the neck and snarled in her face,  
  
"Look, I am fine! Having a half human little brat eyeing me constantly is only going to cause your death once MoonMachinedramon is defeated!"  
  
[I'm not going to let you get involved in this...]  
  
She glared at him coldly. He could feel her gaze pierce through him and he didn't like it one bit.  
  
"Yeah? Well, who's going to take care of you once you start screaming your heart out and fall over just like just now?" Neo gritted his teeth.  
  
"I have no reason to answer you!" Before he could actually blink, she slapped him across the face, making his grip loosen and rammed him into a tree before attempting to cut off his air supply by choking him. He winced slightly, the sting of the slap still present and making his cheek turn slightly red.  
  
"It's my turn to lecture you. I'm honestly to the point where I don't care how much of a cute demon you are, you're hurting because of something in the past so, being a nosy little Halfling I was... or am now... I intend to do something about it. And I mean, now." She dropped him, where he regained his balance and turned to him,  
  
"Now, we've got a gate to open and a stepfather to trash."  
  
Neo blinked. He stood completely and I mean, COMPLETELY still for at least 10 seconds to let the information sink in and suddenly yelled,  
  
"STEPFATHER!? Are you saying that Elrond, is your stepfather!?" Nina didn't answer, only walking towards the other two mons who were waiting for her and before she could take a step closer to them, Neo stood in her way.  
  
"Answer me."  
  
"Or what?" Nina looked up at him angrily.  
  
"Or I'll do exactly what you did to me just now, except include my weapon, as a good reason for you to answer me." Neo patted his dagger by his side. Nina huffed.  
  
"You don't have the guts. Besides, you'll need my help to defeat MoonMachinedramon." Call it being honest to his bet, Neo did exactly what Nina did to him and was tempted to kill her right then and there where he growled,  
  
"I think we can do just fine with one less fighter..." Nina, who was at a height disadvantage, was choking and with a swift kick, had Neo's dagger flying off into a tree and soon, both were trying to pin each other down on the ground in a seemingly life or death struggle.  
  
For a moment, Neo pinned Nina down and attempted to punch her straight in between the eyes. Fortunately, she dodged just in time, looking sideways just to see where her head was, turned to dust. With the opportunity of having Neo's fist still underground, she kicked him off her and attempted to pounce on him. Suddenly, she realized she was hanging in mid-air when a gust of wind hit her.  
  
Nina, with her eyes suddenly as wide as saucers, looked around at who could have done the binding spell on her and looked down, where the rest of the group had just came out of the gate. She pouted.  
  
"No fair!!! I was supposed to spook YOU guys!! Not you doing it to me!!!"  
  
The rest gaped at her, recognizing Nina's voice from her wolf-like appearance.  
  
"NINA!?!?!?!"  
  
Crescent fell flat on her back, panting heavily. Blood smeared her lips, where she had thrown some out earlier and slowly sat up, crouching. Still panting, she looked up. Memoria was dead. With a weak triumphant smile, she stood up.  
  
Memoria was impaled in several parts of her body, namely her heart and having black needles sticking out of her neck in every direction, making it look as if she was wearing a collar of some sort and some were on her arms and legs. She was tied up with magic on a black pillar, where she was halfway embedded into it. Slowly, the still human-like body of hers was crystallizing, turning into an ornament for the pillar.  
  
Crescent healed herself, knowing for sure more guards were going to stop her. She walked past the pillar and glanced at Memoria. She wasn't moving, nor breathing. With a glare, Crescent turned towards the throne. A huge condor statue was embedded onto it.  
  
"...Finally. The Demon Summoning should be in place now." Crescent looked out of the window, which was a few feet away from her and saw thundering black clouds. She didn't feel too happy about this. The Demon Summoning Spell was going to weaken her powers the stronger the spell gets and now, her magic was slowly fading away.  
  
She felt something go past her and shuddered slightly. Then, footsteps could be heard behind her.  
  
"Well done, Crescent... Bring MoonMachinedramon here, now." A voice growled to her. Not minding to turn and see the person, she took a deep breath and bent her head.  
  
"Yes, Master Elrond."  
  
"Yes, this is Nina, the one and only." Lucifer said, stepping out of the bushes he had been hiding in, pulling some twigs and leaves out of his fur. Lars took one look at Lucifer and jumped.  
  
"Who the hell are you!?" Nina's Chaos Lord, which had white armor, stepped up to Lucifer and both mons clasped hands, as if arm wrestling, Chaos Lord said,  
  
"Lucifer," Lucifer raised an eyebrow.  
  
"Chaos Lord."  
  
While the two... uhm... three brothers had a little mental conversation to themselves, Nina was getting irritated, still 'tied up' in midair as if a target for a circus knife-throwing act. She then screamed out loud,  
  
"Hello!! Just in case nobody noticed, would somebody PLEASE unbind me from this stupid wind spell already!?" she wriggled in the spell's bind, still not getting herself anywhere.  
  
Neo Crimson, who had picked himself off of the ground and dusted himself off, smiled and said,  
  
"I'd like to know who put you in that spell to begin with." He teased. He walked over to her and pushed her side lightly, making her twist in mid-air ala puppet.  
  
"Ah yes, you're easier to keep at bay this way." He chuckled. Nina fumed.  
  
"Oh, thanks a lot Neo! As soon as I get down, you're going head-first into that stupid tree over there!!" Then, she shifted her glare to a pair of magicians at the side, who were either giggling or chuckling at her.  
  
"Wick, Wyna! One of you two had better un-cast this spell!!"  
  
"Sorry, it wasn't us." Wyna shrugged, smiling. Nina blinked at her a couple of times.  
  
"Then whoever did this better undo it now!!!!" She continued to 'pull' at her binds.  
  
"No, don't. You do it yourself, Nina." Lucifer said, pointing at the magic pattern formed behind her. The rest looked at him as if he went nuts or something.  
  
"Are you kidding me!? I don't know how to undo a darned spell!" she countered.  
  
"Yes you do. Now, relax. Clear your mind and I'll guide you through." Nina did as she was told, although she had sighed exasperatedly in protest earlier. Before she could even say the first syllable of Lucifer's name, she had landed hard on her rear.  
  
"Ow!" She cried, rubbing her sore rear. Then, a small green ball floated over her head, almost laughing. If it wasn't because of the tiny bead eyes it had, Nina would have called it a ghost.  
  
"Oh yeah, laugh it up Wind Sprite! I'm still a novice at these stuff so if you would kindly point out at whoever had me hanging just now!" The little ball seemed to sigh for a second then floated around a certain someone. He growled and swiped at the poor little sprite,  
  
"Hey, back nat!" one good swipe with the back of your hand and it went off flying. Nina blinked as the voice had rang a bell louder than the looks.  
  
"Lars!!!??"  
  
"Yeah, what!?" Nina noted that his helmet and third eye had gone missing and his clothes were slightly different.  
  
Nina pouted cutely, her cat-like ears drooping slightly and folding her arms across her chest and said,  
  
"Great... And I thought I got surprises for you guys... Spoiler!!" She made a face at Lars, who in turn frowned at her in an annoyed manner. Neo, who felt like he was left out, suddenly piped up,  
  
"Wait a minute, wait a minute... Since you were able to open the Gate... Do you happen to be one of the two VanGuards?" Lars, in his so-called 'VanGuard' form, turned to Chaos Lord. Chaos Lord shrugged, leaving Lars to turn back to the Noble.  
  
"What the heck's a VanGuard?" Wick looked upwards into the sky and his jaw dropped. There was a huge hole in the sky. It had a diameter big enough to swallow up half of the File Island.  
  
"Oh... My..." Wick couldn't finish his sentence. Before he knew it, everything turned black. He knew he wasn't unconscious, he wasn't passing out. The 'Summoning of Demons' has begun.  
  
Crescent stood in the middle of the room, doing a ritual of some sort. There were several separate magic circles scattered on the floor around her and she was standing in a particularly ancient rune circle. A digimon barged in, looking flustered and stopped to catch his breath. He looked at Crescent once and asked, in a somewhat stupid tone,  
  
"What are you doing?" Crescent opened her eyes, glaring at the bishop digimon.  
  
"I'm making tea." She said calmly. The bishop laughed.  
  
"Very funny, Crescent but if I may say something, we don't need any of the ancestral titans you're summoning."  
  
"Oh, I think we will, and I think they would gladly help me dispose of you if you don't get out now before I lose my concentration as you can see how many of them I'm summoning...!" she said through gritted teeth and the bishop instantly shut up.  
  
"Yeah, a swarm..."  
  
"OUT!!!!" Crescent bellowed, using a bit of her strength to shut the door in his face. Huffing, she calmed herself and started reciting a spell. The rune she stood on shone black as well as the others. Soon, dark figures emerged from the runes and as they were gaining shape, Crescent decided to give them life.  
  
"...Oorma-sa-he-bi... SAHO!!!" The creatures' heads suddenly snapped up, slitted red eyes opened wide as they all roared, letting the world know that they were alive once again. Crescent smiled as they all tried to break free from the rune, which automatically paralyzes them upon movement.  
  
"Be patient, my pets... Your time will come." Just then, one of the titans caught her eyes. It was trying as hard as it could to break free from its binds and in the blink of an eye, the rest were trying to do the same. Crescent frowned and resuming her former position, she increased the amount of magic in the runes, causing the titans to calm down. Crescent narrowed her eyes at them.  
  
"...The war begins now..." as she gained control of the titans, she released them, allowing them to search for any intruders.  
  
"Soon, very soon, my time will come..." she muttered under her breath, feeling a cold sweat run down her neck.  
  
Wick opened his eyes and looked around. It was pitch black. He looked down at himself. Somehow, he had digivolved into Necromamon. What was happening? Where was he?  
  
"...This could be the 'Demon Summoning'..." It was a forbidden magic that would allow the user to summon demons from different times at the cost of absorbing all types of magical sources, good or bad. He walked a space ahead of him and was thrown back by a lightning barrier.  
  
"This definitely isn't good... I must find Rico and the others!!" He stood up and took his sword. He stuck it in the barrier and undid it, enabling him to go to a different area, where everything was so cold, he would freeze to death. Just like him, there was an ice barrier. He undid that too and found himself in a frozen canyon. There was a frozen lake and above it, a similarly frozen waterfall.  
  
Wick gathered his cloak around him, chanting a fire spell to keep him warm but unfortunately, it didn't last long.  
  
'Come on... Think! This is either Wyna or Renamon...' due to the cold, he couldn't think straight. Instead, he fell to his knees, thanks to the blizzard around him. In the frozen lake, he saw something shining faintly.  
  
"Thank the digi-world for this..." he said slowly and tried calling out to it.  
  
'Renamon... get up...!' After a couple of tries, it still made no attempt to move and this got Wick frustrated. With the little bit of energy he had that the blizzard didn't blow away, he pounded the thick ice with his fist.  
  
"Come ON!!! ...You're... the only one who can... get us out of this... place..." he said, before collapsing on his side. Just as he said that, the light glowed a bit brighter and actually moved a bit closer to him.  
  
Who is in the ice? Renamon or Wyna? Will Wick survive?  
  
Yoo!!! Sorry for the late update, I've got a big exam coming and yeah, I tried finishing this with as less distraction as possible. I didn't die. I was plainly hibernating... :P  
  
Anyways, after this, the PREVIEW!!!  
  
Chapter 12 preview:-  
  
"Neo, you and your friends are my last hope of defending us. Make the best of it...!" Zedomon grunted as the titan in front of him dug its claw deeper in his chest. Neo's eyes widened and he could've sworn he himself was crying.  
  
"No, I'll stay and fight with you!!!" he insisted. He couldn't lose Zedomon. They were like brothers but unfortunately, the Deva shook his head.  
  
"Go... And Neo, you've grown up..." Those were Zedomon's final words. He smiled at the Crimson one last time before picking him up with one arm and flung him past the closing doors of the throne room.  
  
End of preview  
  
:P I know, I'm evil. Heh, can't blame a girl for liking this bit...   
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!! 


	12. Secrets behind the Silver Curtains

The Rise and Fall- chapter 12  
  
A/N: WHEEEEE (Is high on sugar)  
  
I was planning on cutting the story short but, I'm extending it a bit. :P With a side-quest! It's temporary though, until I can get a bit of an idea on how to do the rest of the story.  
  
PLEASE REVIEW!!!!  
  
Wick lay unconscious on the icy lake, half-covered by snow. The light below him shone a bit brighter and it seemed to call out to him. Seeing he wasn't responding, it moved upwards, out of the ice and into the sky, where it transformed into Renamon. Still in mid-air, the blizzard surrounded her, as if encasing her and emerged as Blizzardmon, otherwise known as Blizz.  
  
The snow fox hovered over Wick's fallen form and turned him so that she could see him. His face was icy cold and it was tinged blue. She touched his cheek and smiled.  
  
'You can't die now. We still have a long way to go.' She then stood up and raised her arms into the air. Slowly, the blizzard died down and they were left on frozen ground. Blizz kneeled down and raised her arm over his frozen body. A soft blue light shone in her palm as Wick's face returned to its normal color. When he finally opened his eyes, he was looking at a smiling Renamon.  
  
"Renamon." Wick smiled at the fox. She simply nodded and slowly disappeared. Wick understood what he had to do next.  
  
"...The rest has to be released from this spell." He walked towards the waterfall, where a portal opened almost instantly. He entered it and had just enough time to block a sword attack with his sword. He looked up and saw Infermon.  
  
"...This is definitely Kotemon..." he sighed. But not for long. His sword had turned white hot and it looked like it would melt.  
  
'Oh great... I've got to get away from his sword...!' he released one hand and found out that his left arm wasn't strong enough to support Infermon's strength. Quickly, he chanted a spell, the best one to help his condition that he knows of and pointed his index and middle finger to Infermon's face. He managed to make Infermon stagger backwards, and that was it.  
  
"Damn...! This spell's draining my magic!!" he cursed out loud and quickly recovered when Infermon had gone out of his daze and started for him again. This time, he HAD to run! It was all empty space around him so he didn't know where was a safe place to head to.  
  
He couldn't use any of his magic now and to think he had only released Renamon. And there are more than seven other digimons to release! Including the kids and himself, he wasn't sure if he could pull through.  
  
Infermon approached him, a few hundred metres away from him. He brandished his sword one more time, pointing it at the flame knight. Instead of coming closer, Infermon stopped and thrust his blade in the air, where half of the saber disappeared into a dimension portal and Wick froze as pain stabbed him from behind, right through his chest.  
  
"Urgh...!!" he gritted his teeth. Infermon had pulled it quarterway out and stabbed again, repeating the whole process numerous time until the dark wizard grabbed the blade behind his back, held it firmly, and pulled it out, drawing more of his blood out.  
  
By the time he had rendered Infermon armless, he was more than ready to succumb to death himself. He had multiple slash wounds and burns to add to the list and still, Infermon wouldn't cease his attacks. Finally, he got frustrated. His arms wouldn't work for him, since they were burned quite badly and he was having trouble moving them, he stepped up to Infermon, up to his full height and did the unexpected,  
  
"WAKE UP, YOU BLOCKHEAD!!!" He threw his head back and headbutted. Both their heads stayed in one position for some time, blood dripping from their foreheads and Infermon's helmet started breaking. It cracked, as if it were a mirror, so did the rest of Infermon's body. And soon, Kotemon was revealed. He looked up at Necromamon, who was far taller than him and gave an apologetic look for inflicting his wounds. Necromamon merely nodded and Kotemon disappeared with a beam of red light.  
  
Wick sat down on the non-existent floor and panted. His head hurt really bad, he thought it was gonna burst. His arms wouldn't move, his legs felt like jelly and in other words, he was exhausted. Just hopefully, he doesn't meet up with the two Beelzemon siblings next.  
  
Drained of any form of energy his body had, he lay down and looked at the blank ceiling, if one would call it a ceiling. His eyelids felt very heavy and soon, he had closed them, in hopes of resting his body enough to stand up and fight once he re-awakens.  
  
'Wick!'  
  
'...Huh...?'  
  
'Wick, answer me!'  
  
'...W-who's... there...?' he focused his mind, which was temporarily weakened from his previous battle and had taken him some time before he could see clearly who had spoken to him. He felt even more tired than ever but nothing pleased him more than seeing Wyna with him.  
  
"...Wy...na...?" the sorceress nodded.  
  
'Thank goodness you're alright. Have you found Neo Crimson yet?' she asked. Slowly, he shook his head, which gave him a headache somehow.  
  
"...No... Why...?"  
  
'I can't find him. Anyway, the rest are fine. They were with me when I first woke up. Wick, do you realize you have just fed the spell?' he didn't understand her.  
  
"...What??..."  
  
'Listen, you're closer to Neo crimson than I am. I can only give you some of my strength but please, make it out of here. I can't bear the thought of the world dying and we can't do anything to help it.'  
  
Wick did a head gesture which would have been called a nod if it wasn't so brief. A cool flow of energy coursed through him, replenishing his lost powers and healing his wounds. When he finally opened his eyes, he heard Wyna one last time,  
  
'Help us get out...'  
  
He stood up from where he lay and looked around. It had changed a bit. The area used to be pitch black. Now it had a bloody tinge to it. And as he stepped a few paces forward, he found himself clutching his head and screaming.  
  
He panted as he recovered from the unknown assault.  
  
"...W-what... WAS that...?" he didn't know how to describe it. It was more painful than what he had ever experienced, it was a mysterious energy that had coursed out, making a sound that touches the soul, tortures it and leaves with whatever it had caused as its source of strength. Friction between layers of magic and pain, some may call it.  
  
The more pain a person experiences, the stronger it gets. And he had a strange feeling he was close to the person, because the pain was getting even more frequent. As he came closer, he though he heard someone scream. When he looked up, he realized he had just entered a new area.  
  
It looked like an endless space, filled with blood-red crystals which shone in an unknown source of light. He looked everywhere and soon learnt that the place was a huge hall and what surprised him more was the creature embedded halfway into a ruby pillar in front of him.  
  
Blood-red hair covered half of his face, eyes closed. His pale face looked fatigued and his arms, along with the lower half of his body were embedded into the pillar. Wick looked on, eyes wide. A liquid flowed from the corners of the digimon's eyes, which he recognized as blood.  
  
"Neo Crimson..." He froze when something rang in his mind; a pulse. It could have been Neo Crimson but, the pulse had a familiar presence to it. Taking a deep breath, Wick looked at a large crystal to the left of the pillar. He was really shocked when he found out Lars was in it, in his VanGuard form. His usually lively green eyes were closed in seemingly deep meditation, head slightly bent down, bat-like wings spread behind him like a cape. A hook-like sword was what he grasped in his right hand (think Tidus'(Final Fantasy 10) weapon) and the other was holding his cannon.  
  
"...I can't believe this..." The pale crimson glow of the crystals suddenly halted, the area turning black. Wick looked up, where a cloud was collecting above Neo Crimson's head. The Noble was gritting his teeth now. Suddenly, an eye opened up in the middle of the cloud, which now spread a web which flowed like silky spider's web.  
  
A black beam shot out of the eye, hitting the top of Neo's head. He merely twitched at first and Wick, from where he was standing, heard a familiar screech. The black beam suddenly turned red from absorbing the Crimson's powers and that was when Neo started screaming in agony. His arms wouldn't move, neither would his legs as they were frozen in place.  
  
Wick too, felt the familiar magic surge as Neo's energy was passed on to the web, flowing outside of the spell and within it. Clutching his head, it grew louder and louder and at one point, broke to silence.  
  
Wick opened his eyes slowly. He was in a castle of some sort and it looked familiar.  
  
"...Am I dreaming...? Isn't this... the Crimson Fortress...?" Wick looked around and entered a small room. There was a female Noble in it, who was giving her back to a black-clad character. They were talking about something he couldn't really make out but as the female Noble was searching for something on her table, the character in black leaned over a crib. What a surprise Wick had when he saw that the character was Crescent!  
  
"My, what a healthy baby you bore, Miluda!" Crescent cooed as she picked up the said child. It had fiery red hair, best described as bloody and big red eyes stared up at the witch. The Noble, Miluda, laughed and nodded, pushing a lock of loose copper hair behind her ear.  
  
"Why thank you, Crescent. It was very nice of you to come and drop by for our little Neo's birthday. Now, where did I keep the ceremonial elexier...?" She said, only turning her head to look at Crescent over her shoulder before resuming her search. Crescent smiled and ran a hand over the baby's cheek.  
  
'Now, my child... One day, you shall become the core of my greatest spell... The Demon Summoning...' she ran a finger from the top of the child's forehead, down past his left eye and continued down to his cheek, where a magical pattern lay. (Imagine the design on Horo Horo(Shaman King)'s head band and put it up vertically.)  
  
'The core...!? A child of that age!!?' Wick shouted. Unfortunately, they couldn't hear him and before he knew it, the friction started again and when he blinked, he was back with the present Neo Crimson and Lars, and much to his surprise, E-vie.  
  
He looked up at Neo sadly, noting the scar-like mark where Crescent has made him the core of the Demon Summoning. He pondered for a while, thinking of a way to get all three of them out at once and as he was thinking, he thought he saw Lars move at the corner of his eyes.  
  
"...Lars? Is that you?" Wick looked into Lars' crystal prison and saw no movement. He scratched his cheek and was about to shrug the thought off when Lars moved, cracking the crystal this time. Wick jumped back in surprise and looked on, where both Lars and E-vie's 'chambers' started to break.  
  
Wyna rubbed her temples.  
  
"Ow..." she mumbled something else under her breath that the others couldn't hear and as she was about to attempt to break out of the spell, Ronfar collapsed on the ground.  
  
"Ronfar! You okay?" Jake looked at his friend and as the rest started crowding around him, he started thrashing about in a childish manner.  
  
"I CAN'T TAKE THIS!!! How long are we supposed to stay here!?" he yelled, deciding that he wanted to throw a tantrum.  
  
Nina, getting REALLY annoyed, walked over to the boy, pulled him in a sitting position by the collar and slapped him a couple of times.  
  
"Snap out of it, will you? While you're there throwing a tantrum, why don't you think of something like, how to get us out!" she released her grip on him and Ronfar whimpered, rubbing his sore cheeks.  
  
Rico looked up. Flashes of red light flew past.  
  
"I wonder what those are. They've been buzzing over our heads the whole time." He noted, looking at the direction they were headed to. Chaos Lord took one look at them and sighed,  
  
"It's most probably Crescent's work."  
  
"Pff, yeah and for all we know, it's most probably from that Crimson guy, whoever his name was." Bee quipped, lying down with his hands behind his head. He had his eyes closed but kept his third eye open, obviously curious about the exact same thing Rico had mentioned. Black, who had been zoning out for the past few minutes suddenly felt drained. Before he knew it, he was looking up at Nina.  
  
"Huh?" he looked down at his hands, which were now claws and he could've sworn his jaw dropped to the ground.  
  
"Oh my god." BlackAgumon stated, still looking at his claws. Nina looked behind her, where she heard Black and found him missing. Oops, she looked down and saw him as BlackAgumon.  
  
"Black, stop fooling around. Before Wick finds Neo and the Beelze- siblings we can't get out of here." Nina said, picking Black up and looking at him from head to toe.  
  
"Heh, whaddya know? Big ol' Black's finally settling down." Bee smirked, sitting up. Black turned to the joker and frowned.  
  
"It's not that!! If I wanted to, I would've digivolved back to the way I was but for some reason, I can't now!" Black wriggled out of Nina's hold and dropped to the floor. The ground suddenly shook and everyone who was standing lost their balance. Thus, falling on the floor.  
  
"What WAS that!?" Impmon(?) yelled, sitting up. He blinked a couple of times and looked down, where he saw his scarf around his neck.  
  
"HEY! I didn't de-digivolve!!!" Impmon started running around in circles. The others have turned to their In-Training forms by now.  
  
"If the normal digimons turn back to babies then..." Nina turned to Chaos Lord. He was turning to stone!  
  
"Chaos Lord!" Nina cried. He looked up at her, breathing hard.  
  
"I never expected to die in a place like this in the first place." Chaos Lord mumbled, shaking his head. His legs were useless now.  
  
"Rico, when's Wick gonna come back?" Kimber asked, huddled to her twin brother. He wanted to give her a positive answer. Unfortunately, all he could do was shake his head and say,  
  
"I don't know... Let's just hope this isn't the end for us."  
  
"Damn it!! Break, I said!!! BREAK!!!!!" Lars bellowed, kicking at the pillar Neo Crimson was embedded to. He had broken his crystal himself, being in his stronger VanGuard form. E-vie however, had to be aided by Wick. He was halfway done with her by now and the pillar was breaking. The eye was hovering over Neo at the moment, ready to open anytime soon. Lars kept on hitting the base and looked up. It was going to open. Grabbing his newly acquired sword, he held it over his head and made a clean horizontal cut right through the crystal pillar.  
  
Unfortunately, the pillar hasn't toppled over yet. E-vie pulled out her new pair of guns and shot the pillar so that it would fall over.  
  
"Pulse Shot!!" the bullets exploded after making contact with the object and to prevent Neo from killing himself, Lars caught him. (along with the thing he's stuck to.) The eye opened and the familiar black beam shot out, hitting the crystal, which made it bounce back on itself due to the mirror-like surface. The amber iris suddenly turned red and the web turned black as they burned themselves.  
  
"...This doesn't look good..." Lars said as the eye shone white and exploded.  
  
Crescent frowned. The spell she had casted was now dissipating. However, the hole the spell had created had grown bigger, now making the sky look like a cracked mirror, ready to break.  
  
"...The spell is... broken!?" she bit her lip hard. It was bleeding, but she didn't care. How could a digimon be able to break it so easily? And when she just gained control of the titans. Now she was sure as hell they were going to go haywire. The bishop digimon that had bothered her was right behind her, looking at the sky as well.  
  
"Hm... wow. What a view. Nice job Crescent, you blew up your own plans." He said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. She turned to him and slapped the bishop across the face with all her might.  
  
"Shut up Frenbren. My strength may not be as how it was before, but I can still kill you. If you have a problem with me, then I'd be more than glad to feed you to the titans!" she glared at the bishop digimon, who was still recovering from her slap.  
  
[A/N: The titans look like the Viguro in Legend of Legaia. Hey, I didn't have a very good sketch of the titans!]  
  
Frenbren said nothing but countered her glare. They both had a glaring competition for a while before Crescent turned away from him and spoke up,  
  
"Is MoonMachinedramon prepared for teleportation?" Frenbren didn't reply immediately but instead, walked towards the door, opened it and looked at her,  
  
"Yeah." Then, he closed the door.  
  
Meanwhile, everyone just warped back to where they last saw each other and the digimons were glad they're back to normal. E-vie was busy looking at herself.  
  
"...Wow... Kind of makes me wonder if mom and dad were like this before..." she pulled out her rapier, which was sheathed behind her. (Think Rutee from Tales of Destiny.) Lars shrugged and Chaos Lord spoke up,  
  
"No, they weren't VanGuards. The previous VanGuards we had here were both born here. They were exceptionally good in everything they do, but their drawback is that they didn't care much of the digimon here. Quite selfish, if I may add."  
  
"...Chaos Lord, is there any way for us to remove the scar on Neo Crimson's face?" Wick suddenly asked. Chaos Lord raised an eyebrow.  
  
"None that I know of, no. Why is that?" Wick dropped his gaze to the ground and shook his head, a bit disappointed.  
  
"No, it's nothing."  
  
"...Hey, someone's coming!" Rico alerted everyone and the very first person to recognize it was Chaos Lord.  
  
"Zedomon? Is that you?" The creature in front of them smiled innocently and scratched the back of his head, one hand holding a silver sword and he had multiple wounds on him.  
  
"Ha, ha... didn't expect to see you guys here. How's everything on your side?"  
  
"How's on our side? Zedomon, you're wounded!" Zedomon pouted and patted Chaos Lord's thick armor.  
  
"Don't worry about me, I'm not the little brat you used to tutor!" he gave the Mega digimon an angelic smile, just to hide his wounds from looking very painful. But, much to his dismay, they started stinging. He winced slightly and looked up at Chaos Lord, in high hopes his former 'tutor' wouldn't notice. Luckily, he was too busy rubbing his temples. Zedomon smiled at the taller mon and turned to the rest.  
  
"So, what do you guys intend on doing now?" he asked, hands on his hips.  
  
"...Well, I for one want to beat the hell out of Crescent..." Nina quipped, crossing her arms across her chest. Zedomon smiled at her, laughing nervously and scratching his cheek at her frankness. Just as suddenly as he had appeared, he drew his sword out.  
  
"Whoa! Hold it! Aren't you helping us!?" Tosh shouted at the Deva. The Deva still had that innocent smile on his face and whirled around, slashing something behind him in half. The rest gasped.  
  
"...Can't believe it followed me all the way here..." he said, starting to breath heavily. Renamon raised an eyebrow.  
  
"Followed you? Whatever for? Besides, how in the world did that titan get here? They were banished a few good thousand of years ago." Zedomon pointed a finger at Nina.  
  
"The person she mentioned can give you an answer. For now, I'm glad you guys are here because we have to stop Crescent before she brings MoonMachinedramon here. If we don't hurry and she does, we don't stand a chance. Now, hurry!" he looked at them over his shoulder and spread his wings, immediately taking flight.  
  
"Neo, get up!! I still don't get a damn thing that guy just said!" Lars started slapping the unconscious digimon lightly, just enough to make your cheek sting after a few slaps. It worked like a charm. Neo got up with a red cheek and in return, he punched the Beelzemon.  
  
"I'm up already!!"  
  
"That took long enough. Now, where can we find Crescent?" Lars rubbed his cheek, where Neo had punched him.  
  
"THINK, will you!? OF COURSE SHE'S IN THE GRAND HALL!! That stupid phoenix Zhuqiaomon must've died from the sudden distortion over the land!!" Neo practically screamed, stood up and started heading for the Sanctuary.  
  
The rest followed him but before they reached the main entrance, strange creatures with long arms and claws stopped them. One of them swiped at Neo, who reflexively jumped a step back and summoned his weapon,  
  
"RED CROSS!!!" The titan in front of him was split in four parts and they fell onto the ground with loud thuds. Behind them, more were coming and they were even more agile than the one they just fought so they decided to head into the Sanctuary. Before the doors closed, Nina noticed someone was missing.  
  
"Chaos Lord...? Chaos Lord!" She looked outside. He was using his huge shield to hold the titans off and in the meantime, Lars, Bee, Black and Lucifer were closing the huge double doors.  
  
"Just go on without me!! I'll hold them off here!" he shouted over the racket the titans were making. Nina almost cried and before she could go back out, the four Mega digimons had closed the door and Bee had wrapped an arm around her waist and ran off with her, knowing she was going to retaliate sooner or later.  
  
"Bee, LET GO!! He's gonna die if we leave him there!!!" she practically shrieked at the biker. Bee shook his head.  
  
"No can do Nina. At this point, we can't afford to turn back, risk our lives and get killed on the way just to get someone else to live. You heard him, he'll hold them off! And I'm pretty confident with his skills so, just stop fidgeting and let's find that psycho-dad of yours!"  
  
Nina lowered her head and looked again at the main door. Battle cries echoed through the halls and all Nina could do was pray he would be fine.  
  
"Crescent, why are these two dead mons here???" Frenbren nearly choked the first time he saw the two familiar digimons standing in magic circles, eyes closed and head bent down. Crescent sighed. She stood up from her sitting position and brushed her skirt off.  
  
"They somehow got caught in my summoning spell. So, I just brought them over." Frenbren glanced sideways at the two 'dead' digimon and cringed. He gently touched the half- mask on his cheek and looked away. Crescent saw this.  
  
"As long as you can defend your ground, they won't be able to stop MoonMachinedramon. As long as you can control yourself, that is. I don't want you ending up like Stigma. Albinnass, the Queen of the chess pieces said so herself."  
  
"I know that! ...Send in both Rooks, I'll hold them off for sure."  
  
"Why? Don't you have confidence in yourself?"  
  
"Don't you have confidence in your precious titans??"  
  
Crescent frowned.  
  
"Truth be told, no. I didn't actually want those things back here. But, Master Elrond wishes it so." Frenbren huffed.  
  
"What made him all powerful again?" Crescent rolled her eyes.  
  
"Have you forgotten? He took the Crimson Shield, silly! And that shield so happened to be the Nobles' enchanted weapon, where they sealed the portal to the Dark Ocean!" Frenbren kept quiet after Crescent's explanation.  
  
"Just send the Rooks out."  
  
"Yo! Took you guys long enough! " They saw a familiar smiling face.  
  
"Zedomon! What are you doing to yourself!?" Neo asked, running up and stopping next to the Deva. Zedomon looked at the younger mon with his usual innocent look and laughed nervously.  
  
"Nothing really. Just getting a few cuts and bruises along the way here. I was hoping to share the 'party' with you."  
  
"Um, exactly, what party are we talking about here??" Dae queried, folding his arms. Zedomon blinked.  
  
"The titans you've been fighting must have beaten you quite badly, and yet you still say you're fine and that they could be made target practice?? Admit it, you're tired." Dae finished his sentence by walking over to Zedomon and patted him lightly on the back. The other digimon staggered forwards and winced in pain.  
  
"Oh, my..." Heather covered her mouth as she saw two of the deepest cuts anyone has ever seen embedded to Zedomon's back. The two gashes started from his shoulder down to his waist and they had actually stained the top of Zedomon's pants red.  
  
Bee sighed.  
  
"Y'know, if that tutor of yours saw this, he would've killed you by now. Li'l liar..." Lucifer whacked him up the head for being rude and Nina nudged him in the ribs for being insensitive.  
  
Strangely, Zedomon still had a weak smile on his face. He shook his head slowly.  
  
"This world means everything to me... And yet, I can't defend it... So, I have a small favour to ask of you," he looked up at the kids and said,  
  
"Make sure you defend yours well." They didn't understand but before they could ask any further, titans started pouring in from the main corridor. Zedomon recovered from his crouching position up to his battle position and drew his sword.  
  
"...Go left on this crossroad. Just keep going into the corridor until you see a silver double door. Now go!!" In their state of confusion and shock, they managed to make it to the directions Zedomon told them.  
  
Once they were at the double doors, both Bee and Lars, who were the fastest in the group, rammed the doors open and unfortunately, some of the titans slipped away from Zedomon's defence and started attacking the one at the back; Neo Crimson.  
  
The Noble dove to the ground to evade a slash and turned over to his back, sword in hand. In the blink of an eye, the titan in front of him had knocked his weapon out of his grip and now, it lay helplessly on the floor, yards away from it's owner. The monster had it's clawed arm raised, ready to thrust and as Neo closed his eyes, waiting for the blow, nothing came. Instead, someone else screamed.  
  
Opening his eyes slowly, he immediately sat up as he recognized the mon in front of him.  
  
"ZEDOMON!!" The said digimon had both hands on the claw, trying to pull it out of his body. He spat out blood and that only caused the titan to push its claw in a few more inches.  
  
"Neo, you and your friends are my last hope of defending us. Make the best of it...!" Zedomon grunted as the titan in front of him dug its claw deeper in his chest. Neo's eyes widened and he could've sworn he himself was crying.  
  
"No, I'll stay and fight with you!!!" he insisted. He couldn't lose Zedomon. They were like brothers but unfortunately, the Deva shook his head.  
  
"Go... And Neo, you've grown up..." Those were Zedomon's final words. He smiled at the Crimson one last time before picking him up with one arm and flung him past the closing doors of the throne room.  
  
"NOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" The silver doors slammed shut and now, the titan was getting irritated. Zedomon looked at his feet and thought out loud,  
  
"...There was never... a twelfth Deva..." tears fell from his eyes, rolled down his cheeks and finally dropped to the floor.  
  
"The reason... was because... I'm an accursed beast... with strength so great, I could kill anything, single-handedly..." his human-like hands suddenly grew to claws, with grayish scales running up his arms, ending just above the elbows.  
  
His elf-like ears disappeared, replaced by horns which protruded from his temples, a dark gray tail and black scales where his pants would have been. Fangs poked out of his lips, completing his beastly form.  
  
'And with this battle, I shall return to whence I came...' with a mighty roar, he broke the titan's arm off and started slashing away at the titans, though outnumbered.  
  
'Hell.'  
  
Neo dug his claws into the heavy silver doors, which used to be protected by Zedomon.  
  
'This room, is the throne room. I protect it. So, one day, should I die, this door will never open, ever.'  
  
Those were what Zedomon told him when he was younger. His claws were bleeding now and as he noticed it, he pulled his hands out of the door.  
  
"Let's go... The grand hall is after the throne room's many doors." Neo said, wiping his tears with the back of his hands.  
  
"Exactly how many doors?" Rico asked.  
  
"...Three."  
  
"Well, it shouldn't be a problem. Let's move out." Black voiced out. Everyone agreed.  
  
They came across a bronze door, which they opened easily. Inside, everyone except for Neo had the shock of their lives.  
  
"...Rouge..." Rico whispered.  
  
"... And Alara..." Kimber finished, just as surprised as her brother was. The said digimon didn't move from their positions, Rouge, as casual as ever, was leaning at the door, arms crossed and eyes closed. Alara was sitting on the steps, leading to the door. She had her head bent down, and her eyes closed as well.  
  
Neo cautiously took a step closer and gunshot ripped through the air. A few inches away from where Neo's foot was a small hole. And it appeared to be from a gunshot. Looking up, he saw Rouge's arm extended, gun in hand and his eyes still closed.  
  
"Who are you!? How did you get in!?" Neo shouted. Rouge opened his eyes, which were an odd red, the same glow the titans had.  
  
"We've been here the whole time." Rouge said, his face not showing any emotion at all. Alara stood up, her eyes glowing red as well.  
  
"This place shall be your grave..." Alara said, drawing her guns.  
  
How will the team parry with the two legendary fighters? Only in chapter 13.  
  
My longest chapter!!!!   
  
Okies, as usual, read and review...  
  
Chapter 13 preview:-  
  
"Infermon, Digivice-breaker power-up!! ASHURA!!" Infermon's huge armor melted into a mere shield and he had gained a more human-like body. His helmet changed as well, turning to a less heavy-looking one. His sword was now a double-edged flame saber. (Think Zidane's synthesized weapons. (FF9)  
  
Tosh's digivice glowed bright red and floated into the sky. It radiated a red light once and shattered, just like Ronfar's. By now, it looked like they had a chance of beating the two dead digimons.  
  
"NOW!!" Neo evaded both Rouge and Alara's attacks while the rest, except Cannondramon's powered-up form and Ashura.  
  
"We'll take it from here, Crimson. Go now!!" Ashura shouted, knocking Rouge off balance and throwing him into a wall. Neo did as he was told and went into the next room, door closed tight.  
  
"So... looks like a death match, doesn't it?" Ashura asked. His cannon-bearing companion nodded.  
  
"If we die here, all our efforts will be meaningless. LET'S DO IT!!"  
  
Hahahaha!!! I shall start writing chapter 13 after more reviews come in!!! 


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